A Lesson Learned In Time
by aRegularJo
Summary: Moving on and growing up isn't as fun as one would like it to be. Sequel to Miles and Miles.
1. Chapter 1

Hello all, again!

This is the sequel to my story, "Miles and Miles." This, too, will have multiple chapters. I'm trying to work ahead, but the posted chapters will probably get edited and revised multiple times as I go along. I'm never satisfied with the finished product. It's fairly necessary to have read "Miles and Miles," so there's my one plug for my other story. I also am in the middle of swim season and coordinating several long-term school projects, so postings might be well-spaced. Very well-spaced.

Disclaimer:

I don't own the recognizable characters from "CSI." If I did, I could probably quit high school and not stress about calculus. I don't own _The Lovely Bones_, which gets mentioned in the first part, and I don't own the song "Good Riddance" which is where the title is from. I do, however, own my flip-flops, lots and lots of Diet Coke, and Jules and Grace. If you're interested in buying, my email's posted. ;-)

Enjoy! Reviews are like cookie dough without the calories!

* * *

Ever since her first plane flight, when she was three, the intense strip of blue always on the horizon had fascinated Jules. To her, this penetrating indigo line, visible only from plane windows, was the truest evidence, the clearest proof of heaven and God in the world. She fervently believed that tucked somewhere within that unreachable strip was heaven. It made sense in her mind: it was in the sky, surrounded by clouds; no live person would ever reach it. She could easily spend the whole flight, whether it was a forty-five minute commuter flight or the time her mother flew her and Grace out to New York City and Washington D.C., staring at that strip, daydreaming about all the souls residing there. In her mind, everything was fashioned out of clouds: the streets were streaky stratus clouds, those fluffy nimbus clouds that made cloud gazing so enjoyable served as buildings and temples. She had loved the book _The Lovely Bones_ simply for the concept of the Inbetween.

Now, though, as the plane cruised from Sacramento back to Las Vegas, Jules studied the indigo strip with a new intensity. It was quickly fading with the darkening sky. Next to her, Grace dozed fitfully. Sara was next to Grace, quietly reading _Glamour_. Nick had already returned to Las Vegas; he had had to work Sunday evening. Jules, Sara, and Grace had stayed an extra day and had left with promises to invite Grandma and Grandpa to Christmas in Las Vegas. Jules always laughed at that statement. _Christmas in Las Vegas_. It sounded like a Chevy Chase movie.

Below, the deserts of eastern California and southern Nevada formed an empty wasteland. Jules was the wordsmith of the family; she crafted words and metaphors the same way Grace, the artisan, crafted three-dimensional materials and created tangible thoughts. It was very easy to find a connection between this emptiness that seemed to stretch on forever below her and the gnawing one she felt inside her chest. She didn't know what was after this desert, or how she could cross it. Most movement was emotionally painful. She had gotten through the funeral, done the speech thing, done the burial. She was parched from the journey. Jules had been mentally coaching herself for months, readying her body for the blow that would inevitably come. She had practiced living day-by-day for the last several days—these dumb, self-help book strategies had allowed her to get through the move to Vegas, the last days of her mother's life, the funeral. Each day had a specific, finite ending to it. Survival of the day was success.

Now, though, her life stretched before like an achingly long, crisp piece of loose leaf. She was essentially on her own. Most nearly-eighteen-year-olds would be thrilled at the prospect of freedom; it terrified Jules. She literally had no idea what she was going to do with herself. Every absolute she had possessed had been shattered and she didn't have any clue what was supposed to happen next. She knew the general outline that Mom would have wanted her to follow: swim this winter, apply for college, do well in the last few months of high school. She would do it, if only for her mother, since she was a dutiful daughter. But the prospect of moving on paralyzed her. Jules was both overly analytical and overly imaginative; this allowed her to plan far in to the future, complete with minute details. She liked daydreaming, visualizing. She didn't like planning in the here-and-now, though she was quite good at it. Jules loved dreaming about her perfect life in the future.

Visualizing this, though, was like trying to see clearly while on a roller coaster in a thunderstorm. She had no idea where to look, what to look for. She felt like a person who knew that she was about to drown—flailing and gulping until the blessed blackness took over.

Sara, in an unusually twitchy state, tossed the magazine into the kangaroo pouch on the seat in front of her and began tapping her fingertips together. Jules studied her out of the corner of her eye. Sara—Sara was one of the things that had complicated everything even more. The disease and death would have been painful enough, deciding to leave the girls with a little-known cousin a state away was a decision that comforted and appalled Jules. It comforted her because it was _Sara_; in the past two months, Sara had proved to be strong and dependable. She was relatable and there was a hint of funniness under her stressed, worried veneer. Sara was obviously kindhearted and well intentioned; she was obviously doing her best and trying her hardest to open herself up and love and be someone else's rock. It was endearing in a klutzy-puppy sort of way. It was appalling because it was yet another thing to start new, the Las Vegas landscape and skyline were harsh and foreign and utterly unlike anything Jules had ever seen. There was nothing like the lush familiarity of Sacramento. She had spent the last three years building a legacy in high school, something that would amount to excellent chances at excellent colleges. She had leadership. She had sports. She was involved and got great grades and high test scores and showed interest in the outside world and had tons of extracurricular goodness. All these connected her, grounded her and made her identifiable. Now, though, they were suddenly gone. Her family was gone. Her life was unattached. She felt like a two year old in a fun house, a coulrophobic at a circus.

However, weirdly—considering how Jules had been more opposed to the move than Grace, who took it all passively—Sara did make things a little better. Sara didn't try to pretend to understand, but she didn't pity them either. She saw everything, accepted everything, would let them make their own decision. Jules trusted her; right now, Jules trusted her more than probably any other adult. Everything just might work out.

Though Jules wasn't planning on betting on that anytime soon.

"I think we're probably about to land." Sara said. "We're only supposed to be about five or ten minutes out of McCarran. Do you want a piece of gum?"

"Winterfresh?" Jules clarified. Sara nodded. "Alright then." She accepted the piece of gum. "Do you want to wake up Grace?"

Sara nodded. "Probably. Better now than later, right?" She shook Grace gently. Grace stirred, rubbed her eyes, and understood what was going on.

Jules turned away from the two of them; she instead started searching the sky again for the indigo strip. It was harder than ever to see in the fading twilight.

She was startled away from peering at the indigo strip as the Vegas Strip jump out at her like a heart-monitor spike. She had never seen it from the air before; it looked like a Martian colony—an outpost settlement in the middle of the desert. As the plane descended cleanly, the glassy façade of McCarran's Terminal D rose suddenly from the ground.

"Is Nick picking us up?" Grace said sleepily as they began to unbuckle their seatbelts and move around the cabin.

"Yeah. I have to call him." Sara pulled her cell phone out of her purse and fingered it. "I'm sure he's at the luggage carousels already; we're actually a little late."

The next several minutes were quite busy; Jules welcomed busyness. It took her mind off—off everything. They finally arrived at the luggage carousels that had loud, large casino advertisements above them. Sara called Nick; he was actually standing by the one their luggage would trip out of. He grinned when he saw them, though it was a very shaky, unsure grin. Sara's eyes sparked with life when they connected with his. Even Jules, wry, cynical, sad, Holden Caulfield Jules, thought it was cute. They kissed—neither Jules nor Grace found it as weird or uncomfortable as Sara thought they did, it was just kissing, plus they liked Nick—and Nick put his hand on the small of Sara's back. "How was the flight?" he asked. Nick was good, too. He didn't ask dumb questions like, 'How are you feeling?' he just took things one step at a time. He was so different from Sara, who thought thirteen steps in advance and usually just skipped six of them for practicality's sake. He was good for her.

"It was—short." Sara smiled. Her smile was out of practice. It looked false and bright. "How has work been? You went in yesterday?"

"Yeah." Nick coughed nervously and took Sara's suitcase, "Grissom—he said call when you get home. Tomorrow would be fine, I think."

"Alright." Sara said. "We should get going. I think we're all really tired."

Nick just nodded, leading them out of McCarran. The gaudy neon of the Strip was visible. Jules looked up, just in case the indigo strip was still there. She knew it wouldn't be. It had been replaced by a flat, faceless darkness. She tilted her chin back to its normal position. Looking ahead, only the foreign, Martian outpost settlement of Vegas was there.

It was, indeed, Jules thought, a brave new world.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer in part one.

Enjoy! Reviews are like cookie dough without the calories!

* * *

The ride home was silent, punctured only by Nick's fingers drumming out erratic rhythms on the steering wheel. Sara leaned on the door and stared outside. Grace stared down at her fingers. Jules's eyes jumped nervously from person to person. Finally, Grace caught her eye and gave her an annoyed stared. Jules looked down at her lap, too, after that.

The last rays of sun were reflecting off the front windows of the house as Nick glided the car into the driveway. Sara was surprised to see Greg slouched on their front steps, two boxes of pizza angled on his left and a six-pack of beer and two 2-Liters of soda on his right. He stretched and stood as they got out of their car and fumbled with their bags.

"Hey," he approached them awkwardly. "I…figured you'd hadn't eaten yet. I brought you pizza. From Delfino's. One cheese, one veggie. And I brought beer. And soda for the girls—Diet Dr. Pepper for Grace and Diet Mountain Dew for Jules. I was just waiting with them. There's no pressure or anything; I'm just going to go. I just thought food would be nice. If you want, I can go grocery shopping for you later. You probably don't have much food, do you?" He finished nervously. He looked angular and whippet-lean in a baggy navy sweater and baggy, dark-blue jeans. His hair was refreshingly messy.

"Thank you, Greg." Sara said tiredly. "Do you want to come in? You shouldn't have to wait with the pizza and not enjoy any of it."

"No, that's alright." Greg said quickly.

"No, I mean it." Sara secretly wanted him to stay, hoping he'd provide some comic relief or some dumb jokes or something to make the girls crack a smile. "Seriously. Nick's staying." Nick looked quite surprised at this pronouncement, but quickly recovered and nodded. "I'll even have Delfino's send over a half-mushroom, half sausage and pepperoni for you guys." That clinched the deal for Greg; he nodded, looking very relieved.

Sara unlocked and pushed the front door opened. Nick, pulling her suitcase, followed, then the girls and Greg with the food. "Jules, Grace, why don't you run your stuff upstairs?" Sara said. "Then come back down; we'll unpack later." The girls said nothing, and followed her instructions.

"The mail should all be in the kitchen," Greg called from the dining area.

Sara sifted the mail through her fingers and let it cascade to the counter. There wasn't anything worthwhile—just a bunch of junk mail, bills, a few sympathy cards, and college mailbox clutter. _The girls need to get on that_, she thought to herself, and the feeling of overwhelmedness, which had been temporarily assuaged, returned. The volume of details she needed to catch up on exhausted her. She checked the voicemail, finding only one call from Margaret, who wanted to see the girls Tuesday morning.

"Sara, come on. Food's up." Nick called from the table. She could smell the pizza spices wafting towards her.

"No fair; I didn't call in your meat monstrosity yet." The girls were seated on one side of the table, Nick and Greg on the other. Sara awkwardly took the chair at the head of the table. She wistfully looked over her shoulder at the door to Lilly's bedroom. It had remained closed since Lilly went into Grace House. "Jules, Grace, Margaret wants to see you tomorrow at Grace House. Ten A.M. Do you want me to drive you down?"

Grace shook her head. "That's fine. We'll just take the Taurus."

"Okay." Sara said. "There's some mail for you. College filler, if you want to look at it. There're a couple of applications in there, too. I think I saw UPenn?"

"God." Jules said, looking at her plate. "It's almost October. I can't believe it."

"You've got time." Sara said noncommittally. "You'll be fine." She reached for a slice of veggie. "I think you should go back to school on Wednesday." She said the last part quietly and casually, as if by speaking softly she could avoid an outburst.

She was wrong, and she knew she was going to be wrong. "What? You're freaking kidding!" Jules said. "We can't possibly go back to school already!" Grace's face looked crushed, and started twitching to avoid outright crying.

"Jules." Sara said, trying to keep her voice calm and rational. "Listen. Please. I have thought about this. You've been out for more than two weeks and you're taking an extremely difficult course load. Your teachers are very forgiving and understanding, and they'll help you of course, but there's a point where there's too much school missed. I've talked with your calculus teacher; there's a test every week. This is _calculus._ It's a bitch no matter how much you like math. And your English classes—you've probably finished a novel in there by now! All your other courses—there's been essays and papers and everything. You need to get back on track." She paused, hoping to not use her trump card. "Your mother would have wanted it. It'll…it'll but things back into focus. Please, guys."

Almost predictably, Jules snapped. "_Don't_ even try to bring Mom into this! I'm not ready; I need at least another week! I can't believe you don't_ get _that." She threw her paper napkin over her slice of cheese and stormed upstairs.

"Honestly." Grace gave Sara a sharp, betrayed look. "Sara, we're not ready." She followed her sister upstairs.

Sara heard a satisfactory _thud_ as she plunked her head on her palm. "I think I'm supposed to go after them, and rationalize, and make them see things my way, right? Be the grown up in the situation and everything." she asked to nobody in particular.

"That's generally what happens in Lifetime movies," Nick swallowed a slice of pizza.

"No, that's more Hallmark movie of the week." Greg said, with a little too much knowledge. "In Lifetime movies, the teenager's allowed to stomp off. They're usually pregnant or something. In Hallmark movies, there's a tearfest and a mutual understanding eventually gets reached."

Nick stared at Greg for a little bit. "We're just gonna let this moment pass, Greggo."

Sara rubbed her eyelid. "Well, I never was a fan of Lifetime movies," she got up from the table. "I'll be back, guys."

"It's okay. You probably shouldn't've had company tonight." Greg said. Sara heard a muted kick, then a suppressed _owwe_ from Greg as she reached the top landing.

She stood in front of Jules' door for several long seconds before knocking and walking in. "You're supposed to wait till I say come in," Jules' voice was muffled by a pillow, and she sounded more bemused and tired than actually mad. Grace was sitting in a chair in the corner, her feet propped on to Jules' bed. Her face was stormy and scared and constricted and conflicted. It twitched occasionally, the muscles around her mouth and eyes clearly not cooperating.

"Jules, sit up, we should talk." Sara's voice was much more organized and task-oriented than she felt. Jules rolled over and up, and brushed her hair out of eyes warily.

"What?" was all she said. "There's nothing to discuss."

"Yeah, there is." Sara's mind suddenly went blank. "You need to be calm and listen, both of you. Don't think I haven't thought this out." She pulled out her trump card early. "Seriously. It's what—it's what Lilly would have wanted."

"Quit using that bullshit line." Jules said fiercely. "Mom would not have wanted to make us uncomfortable or cause any unnecessary pain. And she would've respected our decision, which is to wait until it feels better." She started her wimpering whine up again.

"No. I really don't think so. Remember how she pushed you to stay in school until the very last minute? Lilly thought in terms of the long-range plans. She put long-term gain over personal pain. And you can't skip a month of your senior year in high school. It doesn't work that way."

"Sara," Grace's voice was tentative and reconciliatory. "I know you want us back in school. But, we're not ready. We can't go in and just go around like nothing's different. Honest. We won't be able to handle it. It's better for us—even if it might not look that way—if we just wait a few more days. Take a breather. Get—get more stabilized."

"What are you going to do? You spent all of last week doing the walking around the house bit, the looking through her things. The funeral was very delayed. If the funeral had been last Saturday, you would easily be back in school, and you'd be fine with it, because you wouldn't have a reason for staying at home anymore. But, since we pushed the services back, it just _feels_ like you need more time. You girls are stronger than you think. Tomorrow, you'll go in to school, and we'll talk to your teachers. You're going back Wednesday." The looks on their faces broke Sara's heart. "And I think you'll be better than you think."

"Sara—no. You don't get it. It's—paralyzing. It's seriously paralyzing. I mean, yeah, logically we know that Mom's in heaven and she's not in pain anymore and we've had time to process that, so we're no mad or even sad about her dying anymore or anything, but emotionally we're still completely lost. It's like those weird cult things, where they rebirth the kids in the wool blankets—like how that seven-year-old died or whatever? It's like we've just been reborn. And we've got to get used to the way everything feels and looks and tastes again. It's just so different from what we're used to. And we still miss her so much—it's tangible. I've lost people before, I guess; there was a cat and our father and this guy who sat next to me in Keyboarding died in a car accident sophomore year, but then it was remarkable that they were so completely and ... just gone forever. Now, I can feel it. When I move it feels different. You can't make me go back to school. I'm not ready." Jules' face was painted with dirty tears. Her voice cracked, "I can't. I can't."

"We—we know you're trying your best to respect Mom's wishes." Grace said tentatively. "But—Sara, you loved Mom in your own way, but you can't believe the way it feels right now. It's so lonely, and scary, and sad, and empty."

"Really?" Sara's voice was deadly. She didn't make eye contact with them. "I don't—I don't understand an absolute, complete loneliness and detachment? I don't _understand_ what losing a parent feels like? I can't comprehend the way it feels when you've been flipped upside down several times by the shitty hand you get dealt. I don't know fear?"

Grace's eyes widened as everything clicked. "I—Sara—I don't mean it that way."

"Grace, I've lost more parents than I've had." Sara's voice was tinged with anger, but mostly persistent and argumentative. "I lost my father to a bullet, my mother to prison, and then my mother rejected me because _she_ couldn't handle it. I had nine different homes when I was a teenager. Girls—you have been through a lot. And, granted, your mother's circumstances were entirely different from mine. But I think that you're totally capable of going back to school. It's scary, yes, but it's not dangerous and it's not detrimental, so you're going. Wednesday morning, school starts up again. Girls," she looked down and traced the stitching pattern in the comforter. "I'm not your mother and I'm never going to try to be, but don't toss out my eighteen years on you, my life experience, and the fact that I'm trying my best to respect your mother's wishes. I'm just trying to be fair. She wanted someone to watch out for you and that's what I'm trying to do. It's tough but school is seriously the best thing for you right now." She stood up. "I'm going to finish my pizza. Delfino's is like the best pizza in a twenty-mile radius." She left.

The girls looked at each other, wide eyes filled with trembling tears. "Grace," Jules questioned quietly. "Have you opened your letter yet?"

"No." Grace said. "Have you?"

"No—it's like the last link to Mom, in a way, you know? I'm scared."

"Me, too." Grace whispered.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer in part one.

Whew! It's been a while, but between swim team, calculus, lit, and Homecoming it's been a veddy veddy busy two weeks! Also, when _CSI_ premiered last week—I realized that, since I started writing this story around _Nesting Dolls_, and a lot of stuff had happened since then, like Nick's burial and the team's getting back together, my timeline was really weird. So, I spent a couple of days rewriting stuff so that it would fit in both the _CSI _world and _My CSI _world. A rough sketch: the story started in the July after Nick's May burial. The school year started in August, and Nick and Sara got together in mid-September. It's now mid-October. The team is together, and Sofia is a detective. Enjoy! And, as always, review!

* * *

"Sara. Come in. It's nice to have you back." Grissom sat up a little straighter, neatened the myriad papers on his desk, and adjusted his glasses. He moved the Ramen noodles container he'd been eating out of onto a filing cabinet. "How—was the funeral?"

It was Tuesday night, about fifteen minutes before Sara's first shift back was to start. She was dead tired; she'd grown too used to a normal schedule. The day had been full, too; visits to Margaret, a call to the school, a visit from Meredith, Grace and Greg had gone grocery shopping. Nick had called, at about eight AM, saying that he and Grissom were tied up over a case, an apparent housewife murder. "It went as well as could be expected." She said sadly. "The girls handled it really well. I was proud of them."

"That's very nice." Grissom said, feeling a little lame. "I hope everything will work out."

"It will, eventually. Nick said you wanted to talk to me?" Sara drooped into a chair.

"Yes. I do." He said. "Sara—this is a tough situation you're in. You're in charge of two teenagers on the exact opposite schedule that you're on. So, I talked to Ecklie—if you'd like, you can transfer to Days, no waiting for an opening on their shift."

"Oh. Wow." Sara was slightly taken aback. "With Denny, and Denise Nichols, and Chelsea Wassherface?" she clarified. "Is Mike Harper still supervisor?"

Grissom nodded. "It's completely up to you." He said graciously. "I know there are probably several things to consider."

"Yeah. Alright. Thanks. Can I give you an answer tomorrow?"

Grissom nodded briskly. "Of course. Shift's about to start. There's nothing in yet, but Catherine has some stuff from a homicide three nights ago if you'd like to go help her. She's mostly done, I think—some wrapping up. I have something to finish up."

Sara's head swam as she walked down to the break room. On one hand, sleeping at the same time the girls slept, being in the house at night so they (and she) would feel safer, being able to do things with them in the evenings—these were all good things; good reasons to take the transfer gratefully. Her current schedule was disruptive and sometimes confusing.

But…she was feeling selfish. She _liked_ night shift, she was finally back on a shift with Warrick and she and Catherine were working together well enough, she liked Grissom and Greg and the lab techs like Jacqui and Archie and even Hodges—bless his snarky ass. And, if she switched to Days, she would never see Nick. She wanted to see Nick. She was interested in pursuing whatever the hell they had going on. She was actually interested in trying to support her half of a stable, adult relationship, to try and get emotionally invested in it, and she thought this milestone was something important enough to be selfish over. Though their lives were often flip-flopped from any normal person's schedule, it worked for them. Certainly better than if she switched to Days. She didn't know the people from Days well, but there was always an underlying competition, something that didn't click between the two groups.

Catherine was sitting at the chipped table in the break room, going over reports and photos with a blue highlighter. Her cell phone and pager were thrown haphazardly next to all her papers.

"Hey, Catherine," Sara said, crossing to the coffee machine. "Have you seen Greg?"

"No, not for a while. How was the funeral?" Catherine sipped her own coffee and didn't look up.

Sara sighed. She was sick of the question. "As good as it could have been. Catherine," she questioned, "how did—do, I guess—you handle having Lindsay and these hours?"

Catherine set her coffee cup down. "Grissom talk to you?" she asked casually.

"Yeah." Sara poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down. "It's just…I guess…I don't know what the right choice is. I don't want to switch shifts. I don't know if there is a right choice. So…what do you do? How was it working these hours?"

"Well," Catherine said. "First off, Lindsey's still only thirteen, only an eighth-grader. Jules and Grace—they're much older. Four years doesn't seem like a lot, but it really is. There's a sophistication, a self-confidence, I guess, or something. Lindsay will get there, off course." Catherine started to veer and Sara nodded. "Secondly, most of the time when I was working late nights and trying to get started, Lindsey was much younger. Also, we weren't very well off for quite a while. I didn't have too many options. It's…not really the same thing."

"But, it is." Sara said earnestly. "The girls… they're really so young right now. I'm sort of leaning towards them needing me all the time."

Catherine waved a hand. "I haven't met them. Trust your gut. I learned that the first time Lindsey was sick, really sick, as a baby. Trust your gut. Being a parent—a guardian—it's the exact opposite of being a CSI. I'm sorry I can't really be of any more help."

"Thanks. Do you need help?"

Catherine shook her head and waved her off. "I've got everything covered. Warrick assisted, it was pretty routine. By the way," she looked up before returning to her papers, "what you're doing—it's really brave of you. Teenagers really suck. And—with their mother, and everything—you're doing something great here. But, God, it will get tough." Catherine stood. "I've got to go meet Warrick in Layout, I'll see you around."

"Thanks, Cath." Sara said, peering down into the near-empty swill of her coffee cup.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer in part one.

Here's the latest. Please keep reading and reviewing! I'm trying to stay as on top of the story as I can.

* * *

A warm, buttery, yummy smell hit Sara as soon as she hit the front stoop. Nick's SUV was parked in the driveway, and Sara hoped that it was his cooking and not one of Grace and Jules' 'experiments.' "Someone cooking something?" she called as she followed voices to the kitchen. 

"Nick came over to make us pancakes." Jules said. Her voice cracked something within Sara; it was sad and bleak and scared and tired, but had the smallest tendril of happiness wrapped around it. She laughed when she saw him, dressed in a frilly blue apron.

"Good morning." She said, walking over to kiss him. He tasted faintly like pancake batter, which was actually kind of gross in an endearing way.

"Morning. Sorry I didn't stick around after shift—Grissom and I were working on that case, you know, and we went through till like two AM this morning, and then I just went to my place and crashed and came over here."

"No problem." Sara hadn't seen Nick at work at all the previous night, nor the day before. She missed him. And the damn problem would only be compounded if she switched to Days.

"You want one, Sar?" Nick interrupted Sara's thoughts.

"Two, please." She put her purse on the counter. The girls were both dressed neatly, with wan complexions and long faces. Grace wore the blazer-and-pleated-skirt combination, while Jules had chosen the combination of Oxford shirt, tie, and wraparound skirt. Grace's pancakes had chocolate chips in them, whipped cream and chocolate sauce on top. "You're going to be sick at school." Sara commented.

"That's the plan." Grace said, her voice sarcastic and edged with darkness and daring.

"She wanted to put cookie dough on top." Jules joked. "Nick just didn't want to mix up a batch of cookies too."

"Oh, really?" Sara laughed it off and looked at Jules' All-American pancakes: blueberry-stuffed, topped with strawberries and whipped cream. "Those look good."

"What do you want, Sar? Bananas, almonds, brown sugar…" Nick's pancakes were paper-thin, almost crepes; he relied solely on toppings and fillings to make them interesting.

"Sounds wonderful." She sat back and sighed contentedly. "You guys ready?"

"No," Jules snorted.

"Jules, please don't be argumentative." Grace said tiredly. "Just—go with it? Let go. Don't make this difficult."

"You're one to talk." Jules retorted.

"What is _that_ supposed to mean? _You're _always the one who's argumentative and obnoxious."

"Girls," Sara said sharply as Nick placed pancakes in front of her. "Have you eaten?" she questioned him distractedly, picking up a fork.

"I'll make mine next." He reassured her. "When do you girls need to get going?"

"Too soon." Jules said.

Sara shoveled pancake into her mouth. "I want to come with you. I need to talk to your administrators and stuff."

Grace pushed her plate away. "Well, we have to _now_. Can you just, come in later, or something?"

"Yeah," Sara said, trying not to sound hurt. "Yeah, that'd work too. I want to sit for a little bit, anyways."

"How was your shift?" Jules asked politely, stuffing books indiscriminately into her bag.

"Boring." Sara swallowed. Nick sat down next to her, his plate loaded with raspberries, orange slices, lemon topping that he'd brought from his apartment and left in her cabinet, mangoes, melons and blueberry sauce. He called it a Rainbow Pancake. It was his second-favorite; his favorite was some sort of weird Texas breakfast palette, with lots of bacon and fried ham and sausages and eggs and peppers and fried potatoes smothered in salsa, sour cream, and guacamole. Sara thought it looked disgusting. "Nothing really happened. A few breaking and enterings we let Greg take."

"You ready?" Grace said breathlessly to Jules.

"Yeah. See you tonight, I guess, Sara." Jules stood up and pulled at her skirt. Grace echoed her sister's sentiments.

Sara stood up and awkwardly hugged them. "Thank you for… you know, doing this. You'll be fine; it'll be tough today though." Grace hugged her back tightly; Jules' was much quicker. "Remember, go to the headmaster's office when you get there…remember how he wrote a note saying he'd like to see you when you get back? And what time are you two due home?"

"I have a dryland workout." Jules said, "And regular season practices start in about two weeks, every day before and after school."

"I'm supposed to go down to the courts and scrimmage some." Grace replied, dully and thickly, testing her tongue around the foreign, ordinary day's events. "It should be around six or so."

"Okay. I'll see you then." Sara tried to smile, but Grace looked down and Jules away. They walked to their cars silently, not looking back towards Sara but clearly displeased.

She hated that her chin trembled. She turned to Nick, "I did the right thing, right?"

Nick nodded and swallowed more pancake. "I think so. And, don't freak. They'll think so too in a few days. I don't want to say the word normal—you don't feel back to 'normal'—" Sara involuntarily shuddered as she thought back to his underground terror, "but a schedule, ordinaryness will help."

"I hope so," Sara involuntarily shivered, then walked to the window to watch them drive away. "How was your shift last night? Did you solve the case?"

"We're working on it. I told Brass I'd meet him at the station at about one PM." He said.

"That's good." Sara was secretly very thankful; Nick had been so strong and supportive for the last several weeks, and she was just beginning to feel guilty that she'd taken advantage of him, that he really needed someone there for him right now, too, and she wasn't fitting the bill. "You should sleep more, though—you've had what, five hours?"

He shrugged. "I'm good. It was enough to recharge."

"What are you doing till one? We could go out and grab a lunch or something."

Nick smiled. "That sounds good. I actually have a counseling appointment, down at the clinic, in a little bit…I just stopped by to see the girls. You should sleep, anyways." Nick had been required to see a psychiatrist in order to be cleared for returning to work; Grissom had insisted that he go to a few more sessions after the clearance.

"Thank you for breakfast, again." She said, and smiled. "And, Nick, really… thank you for being so good these past few days…weeks, really." She swallowed, "I just wanted…I don't know…It's like all take and no give on my part…" she stumbled over her words, which she had rehearsed in the break room. Relationships—at least in Sara's case—did not tend to work out, did not tend to be fun-filled, happy, in-for-the-long-run, or mutually beneficial. This was another positive step. She was full of them today, she thought ruefully. "It's…you got in really deep, it hasn't really been fun— and you've been so strong through it, so…I'm just—"

"Hey, it's fine, Sara." Nick gave her a crooked smile. "It's been hell these past few weeks…And you've been great with the girls; give yourself some credit. I'm doing good, right now. If there was…something, I'd come to you. Don't freak out and do that punishing-yourself thing."

Sara looked straight at him, and saw something, warm and open and confident, right there in his eyes. "I just want you to know—I'm here. I promise I'll do my best." She finished lamely before changing the subject. "So Grissom talked to me today."

"What'd he want?" Nick scooped fruit into his mouth.

"He actually offered to get me switched to Days…for the girls, and all."

"You take it?" Nick said cautiously, unsure how to read the situation.

"Actually, no, not yet. I'm not sure if I want to…I see the girls all evening, and it's not like we'd be bonding when we're all sleeping anyways. Plus, I only need four or so hours a sleep, and I'm good to go. They're almost eighteen, too—I need to find out when their birthday is, but they're not little kids, they're practically grown-up, so I think they can handle it. I was considering, though—I've got four months of vacation saved up, over the last six or so years. Do you think he'd let me stay on shift, but only come in three nights a week, and be on call for the other four, instead of two nights on call?"

Nick nodded. "That should work—hell, it might even make Ecklie happier. Damn budget keeps getting trimmed."

"True," Sara nodded, then yawned. "It's be nice, though—all being on the same shift. Hell, I have conversations with Warrick more than once a month now, and it's not very tense like it used to be." Her face darkened. "Nick—have you told anyone about us? Is there some—policy—that's being violated?"

Nick shrugged and stood to take his plate to the sink. "When I flew out for the funeral I had to tell Catherine. And Greg knows—suspects, maybe—about it. Did you want to keep it a secret or something?" his words sounded too-careful, even to him.

"No," Sara said quickly. "I just wanted to know if we shouldn't act together or something…if you wanted it that way." They looked at each other and burst out laughing. "God, I feel like an idiot."

"Well, I actually do have a…wondering." Nick said hesitantly.

"A wondering? Can the word be used that way?"

"I don't know; the girls kick my ass at grammar." He replied. "Anyways…have you talked to…the girls…about us? I mean, when I can come over and when I shouldn't…things like that. I—I don't want to make the girls uncomfortable, but they're eighteen and should handle this maturely, I think."

"No, I haven't." Sara looked down. "I should—I don't know what they're comfortable with, about anything really, right now. I supposed I should have this talk—over dinner maybe?"

"That sounds like a good idea. Be calm, be rational, be logical."

"Be me." She rolled her eyes. "You wanna come? We should take them out to dinner too, sometime this week."

"I'll see where I'm at with the investigation, for tonight. I think they'd like to go out later this week. And, actually, I've got to get going." Nick was smiling broadly. "I'll call you once I'm done…but you need to sleep, don't forget."

"Quit worrying," she said, poking him good-naturedly and giving him a kiss.


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer in part one.

Did you think I forgot? Well, life's been happening, so I've been trying to write. Unfortunately, most of the writing I do is the super-scary stuff—_college application essays_. (Dun, dun, dun) However, I'm really trying to write this, and finalize what exactly I want happening. (I'm actually trying to be a **writer **and plot things out.) So, updates are going to be sort of slow, but I'm trying! Please hang with me. I love y'all to death!

* * *

Jules shifted, frustrated, and angrily tossed the book back into her bag. She folded her arms. Next to her, Grace patted her hair—which looked perfect as always—and twisted her rings around her fingers nervously before moving on to absently spinning the charms on her necklace. Jules fidgeted more.

The headmaster, who had written them to make sure they stopped by before returning to classes, was, of course, out at a meeting when they had arrived. The secretary had advised them to wait until he returned—"It won't be too long." She promised. Grace had sighed and pulled out her iPod, flicking the wheel until it hit any song by Joni Mitchell, Tori Amos, Alanis, or Fiona. Jules had stupidly forgotten her iPod at home, and contended with rereading _1984_, which she didn't even like but it was in her backpack. It was thirty minutes later, more than halfway through first hour, and the damn headmaster had yet to show. She turned back to the god-awful, depressing book.

Finally, he bustled in, muttering something to the assistant about the "goddamned board of Trustees." She pointed in the twins' direction, and he smiled. "Julia. Grace. Come in to my office. It's nice to have you back." Jules raised an eyebrow; he sounded so phony. "Take a seat," he said, striding to his chair and looking important as he walked and flipped through memos at the same time. "Anyways, girls, sorry to keep you waiting so long. Had I known—" he hesitated uncomfortably, and Jules almost reminded him that Sara had called on Tuesday, "What your exact day of return was, we certainly would have set some time specifically aside." The girls nodded mutely, so he took a deep breath and continued. "Anyways. We're quite sorry for your loss. I know that sounds completely clichéd, but we are, and I know I speak for the staff when I say we're all here for you, if you decide you need something. I understand that you're living with your cousin; I've been in contact with Ms. Sidle. Your mother was very prescient in transferring you to a private school for your last year; we're very close-knit and supportive. We'll be able to handle your…special circumstances better than a public school." The girls nodded again. He looked between them nervously, and kept talking. A thin rim of sweat appeared below his hairline. The brisk, straight-up-here's-the-deal method that reassured and even inspired anal helicopter parents was not going over well. Jules wanted to do something obscene or rude, like flip him off or pick her nose. "How are you feeling?" he tried again.

"Really sick of that question." Jules said tartly. Her sister gave her a look, and then apologized to the headmaster.

"Alright." The headmaster said shortly. "Anyways, the second thing I need to talk to you two about—most of our other seniors have been meeting with Vicki, our college advisor, several times since their sophomore year. Now, we understand that you two are new—but you both should meet with Vicki by the end of this week, so that we can compare match colleges, reaches, your activities, and such, so that you can start the application process. You're both quite bright, and applications will be due before you know it. And, from my meeting with your mother, I know that this is quite important to her—that you two receive the best postsecondary education possible. What exactly do you two have in mind for next year?"

They looked at each other, and Grace sighed heavily. "I'm not sure we're really ready to answer that question, sir."

He pulled his lips in until he had a fish-face. "Well. You're both quite bright. I don't need to tell you that the deadlines are literally weeks away. To write the best essay, to get your paperwork in order—it takes time, ladies; you need to get serious." He smiled brightly. "Why don't I call over to Vicki right now—see if she has any openings today. If you go together, I'm sure we could fit you in over lunch or something. Vicki's an excellent resource; any school would be honored to have such a dedicated counselor. She'll know every visiting admissions officer to any school; with her, the ground will be caught up extremely quickly."

"Sir, thank you for your generosity." Grace began to speak, because Jules was too angry to know where to begin, "but, right now, we're still recovering—it's been…I can't explain it, I really can't, but it's been unspeakable. We'll get everything figured out, in time, but right now, we've missed almost three weeks of school. We need to focus on making up _that _ground first."

He opened, and then closed, his mouth, "Right you are. You're quite bright, you know, we do have great faith in you. I'm sure everything will work out. I'll give your names to Vicki; she'll be in contact with you."

"Thank you," Jules said, extending her hand. "We should really get back to class."

"Yes. Of course. Enjoy your day," he winced at his final thoughtless statement.

"We'll be sure to keep in touch over our delicate psyches and uncertain futures." Jules smiled. "Have a wonderful day."

As soon as they were out of the office, Grace grabbed her sister's elbow. "What the hell was that about?" she hissed. "There wasn't any reason to be so awful to him."

"What?" Jules replied irritably. "He was being a superficial, inconsiderate prick. What an ass."

"Still—respect and all that? Remember?" Grace's eyes teared up. "God, what is your _problem_? Suddenly, Mom's _gone_, and you're—acting differently. You need to calm down. He was _trying_."

"Gracie, no." Jules felt deflated. "Jules—he was just being a jerk, and I didn't feel like calling him on it, and I didn't feel like brushing it away, either, you know? I just…wanted to…I knew I could get away with it, so I did."

"That doesn't make it _right_." Grace hissed, frustrated. "Don't you get it?"

"Oh, Grace. Cut it out. Listen. I'm sorry, alright. God, I won't do it again."

"Whatever," Grace muttered, close to tears. "Let's just get to English, alright?"

That was the worst thing, Jules decided, staring around and wishing to be anywhere else: the school was small, and private, so there was only one or maybe two sections of several of the classes, so she was stuck with Grace, who honestly seemed really upset with her, for most of the day. She watched her stalk off in the direction of the AP Lit class.

Grace pushed the door open; Jules quickly tripped forward so she would arrive at approximately the same time as Grace.

The dozen students in the class were arranged in a circle; a class discussion was obviously going on. As soon as she saw this, Grace, who had marched away from her sister blazing and self-righteous and royally pissed and confident, wilted quickly, and seemed to fold inwards. Jules stepped up. "Hi, everyone." She tried to smile. "Where should we sit?" she knew—well, she hoped—that they still remembered them.

Mrs. Dunbar recovered first. "Yes. I did get a message from Ms. Sidle saying you'd be returning." She smiled briefly. That was the second bad thing about a small school—Mrs. Dunbar didn't have to explain to the class, or wonder, if they knew whom, exactly, _Ms. Sidle_ was. Everyone knew everyone's business. "Come, sit down. We're discussing some parts of _Crime and Punishment, _and, since you haven't started, why don't you just listen? And stay after class, so I'll get your schedule worked out. It's nice to have you back. I'm sure you'll both continue to make great contributions to the class."

They nodded briefly and took seats at the back of the class. Jules slouched down as far as she could, crossing her arms tightly. She scribbled _This sux_ on a bright blue Post-It, and slid it towards her sister. Grace crumpled it up before putting it in her bag. She had a distasteful expression on her face and didn't look at her sister.


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer in part one.

Here's the next installment; I'm trying to stay far enough ahead of the postings so that I don't have to repost old chapters that have been reedited(I had to do that almost every other chapter with "Miles and Miles" and it sucked, so I'm really trying to avoid that.). Also, again—just pretend that pretty much everything that's happened since the end of last season hasn't happened, except for "Gumdrops" though I actually haven't seen that episode, and Sofia's switch to a detective. Enjoy! And review!

* * *

Grace and Jules stumbled through the day, sticking with each other but not really talking. Grace was still incredibly ticked off with Jules—didn't her sister _get_ it? Instead of trying to live up to Mom's expectations of respect, good manners, and tact, Jules had turned into a human hurricane, intent on disrupting anything in her path. She was snippy to the math teacher, someone mentioned to Grace that Jules was 'acting up' in band, she snarled at a lunch lady. That morning, Grace had only been half as worried; Jules was fine with Sara and Nick. But now, at school, she was just being _nasty_. Grace was sick of being the meek, polite sister who put up the good front and didn't say anything while letting Jules pitch her fit in public. She was actually relieved to go to tennis practice.

Grace liked her new tennis coach; Jennifer wasn't anything like Coach Morriston back home, but she was youthful, energetic, and passionate about the sport. She was the tennis pro at the Desert Hills Country Club, too, where the girls practiced.

It was cooler out, meaning that it wasn't 120 degrees, thankfully. She tightened the laces on her clean white shoes and took a deep breath before emerging from behind a set of lockers. Tennis's official season was spring, but the girls all played on the same club team, which conveniently was coached by Jennifer, too.

The other girls, in the other part of the locker room, were laughing and changing. One particularly outgoing one, a junior named Sascha, was dancing around a la Tom Cruise in _Risky Business_. Grace quickly put her head down, sproinged her fingers against the strings to test them, and walked out to the courts.

Only one of the other girls was standing there. Charlotte Ambrose was an intense, slightly scary junior seeded second on the team, though Grace was fairly certain she could beat her when they reseeded—Grace knew that she was quicker than pretty much everyone else. Charlotte was tall, lean, with chocolate-milk skin; her longs legs and muscular arms lent her an excellent serve, though she was more net-game than sheer power, which would eventually be detrimental. Her hair was pushed back with a powder-blue headband, and she wore a matching shirt and wraparound white skirt. Grace shrugged and decided that she'd have to make friends sometime.

She walked up to Charlotte, who was practicing her serve, picking up stray balls and batting them away with her racket as she moved. "Hey," she said.

Charlotte turned to her, startled at being interrupted. "Hey," she said tentatively. "You're back?"

Grace rubbed her lips a little before replying. "Yeah. Do you want to practice? I'm a little rusty."

"That's alright." Charlotte said. "You're kinda entitled," she blurted out, then immediately covered with, "I'm sorry. That was insensitive."

"No, it's alright." Grace said. "Do you just want to serve back and forth or whatever?"

"Yeah. Hey, I'll switch sides." Charlotte jogged across to the other half of the court. "Hey—I'm sorry. I should have said that first, but I'm sorry." She looked completely unsure of herself. "If it helps—and I'm again, completely sorry if this is totally insensitive—but my dad died, car accident, when I was eleven. I know the situations are totally different, of course. But—yeah. It's horrible. So, I'm sorry. And I've been there, too—if you ever need advice, or—I don't know. This conversation's getting really stupid. I'm sorry. I'll just serve now." She swung her arm upwards in a perfect arc before slamming the ball towards Grace.

They volleyed back and forth for a while, but the ball eventually went past Grace. She didn't mind; her heart wasn't really into it. The rest of the girls were petering out of the locker room, anyways; Jennifer was tightening her ponytail in the doorway of her small shed of an office. Grace began to play with her racket strings and walk away, before abruptly turning back to Charlotte. "Does it stop?" she called suddenly.

Charlotte stopped walking, too. She knew what Grace was talking about. "Does what stop? The ache? Or the meaningless words of 'sympathy'?" she drawled the last few words.

"Any of it. All of it." Grace said desperately.

Charlotte smiled and shrugged. "Not really. Not for a long time. But, just when you're sick of everyone being timid and especially, overly kind, it stops. They go on, they have other crap to deal with. And then you want it back. It's still kind of like that for me, on stuff like Father's Day, or Christmas, or his birthday or his death anniversary. You want other people to notice, and to hug you. But—maybe if you mention it, they'll do it the first couple of times. But after that, it's just—lonely. But, hey," she tried to smile. "You're a twin, right? That means you've got like a built-in partner, who's been there and is experiencing everything and reacting to it, too, and all that. My sister's four years younger, she wasn't a help. She was only seven. She's still only twelve."

Grace sighed. "Yeah—but Jules and I are really, really different. I'm quieter, polite; she's willful and independent and always one of those trailblazing people. She—anyways, we take things differently—right now she's being all angry and bitchy with everyone. She's just being so _Jules_ about it. She's anxious and hyper and she always assumes the worst in a crisis. Which is weird because she's one of the most organized, single-minded people I know. But she's high-strung, I guess."

"But you understand, right?" Charlotte said hopefully, like a negative reply would crush her illusions about twins. Which, Grace knew from experiences with other non-twins, were mostly unfounded and had the word 'telepathy' in them. "I mean, you know her completely, so you know _why_ she's acting like that?"

"I know her enough to know I should have anticipated the reaction." Grace said hotly. "But I'm not going to condone it. She's in the wrong. Mom—" her voice cracked but she was getting much better at this, "Mom wouldn't have liked it. And she knows that."

"Give her time," Charlotte shrugged again. "My mom and I—for a whole year or so after Dad died, we would just argue and argue. I didn't speak to her for a month when her sister set her up with this guy. It was just shocking—we'd been so close, and I thought we were alike, but—" there was that shrug again, "even the smallest differences in personality—there were big differences in our reaction. But eventually, your sister's going to be the only one who remembers the stuff that you're remembering on those big days, so just give her room and keep being close to her, I guess. Mom and I eventually worked through it. She remarried a couple of months ago, and we're doing good now, pretty much. But it took a long time."

Practice started then, and Grace concentrated as much as she could on the drills and scrimmages that she was assigned. She did Tennis Suicides, worked on her serve, and did forehand/backhand drills. She found that if she concentrated totally on the task, she could wipe her mind fresh. Almost, anyways.

As they were all packing up, putting their rackets in duffels and pulling Nike synthetic zip-ups over themselves, Charlotte approached Grace. "I was wondering—do you want to go out for smoothies or something right now? There's a great juice bar only a few blocks from here."

Grace hesitated, unsure how to turn Charlotte down. "Sure," she said, surprising herself. "You lead the way."

Charlotte drove to a small, strip-mall store called The Juice Box. Tiny, and decorated in bright tropical colors, it was mostly empty. They ordered at the counter before sitting down. "So, why did you start to play tennis?" Charlotte asked brightly, setting her purse aside. "You're really good, you know."

"Really? Thanks." Grace sat across from Charlotte. "Well. I was about six, or so, and my mom was a court judge at local tennis matches. We lived in California— Sacramento— everyone played tennis really, and Mom loved tennis. So she'd drag me and Jules along, and eventually we just started taking lessons. We both played till we were about nine or ten, but then—I don't know, it stuck with me but it didn't stick really with Jules. She was swimming by that point—she was always this tall, long, little kid. She could kick and paddle her way into medals. With Jules, that was the hook. Eventually, she fell for the _sport_—but when it was swim practice or tennis practice and swimming got her medals, she went with that. I kept playing tennis. It was fun, lots of my friends did it, stuff like that. When I was about thirteen, I joined a tennis club; since then—it's just been something fun, that I know I'm good at and I like to do well with it. I like the feeling, you know? After you've played a great game. But, it's not like swimming, where thirty seconds can make or break you. I'm too—that's not for me." She smiled. "What about you?"

Charlotte smiled at the barista—was that the right term, if they served smoothies instead of lattes?—as she set their drinks down. "Well," she said, stirring the straw in her strawberry-vanilla smoothie. "My dad, actually, got me started. We didn't used to live here—my mother moved us out here a year after Dad died so that we could get a 'fresh start.' Anyways, we used to live in Maryland. My dad was white, came from this _very_ wASPy family. I actually call his mother 'Grandmother Helen.' They were around at the founding of Virginia, some ancestors of his served in the House of Burgesses or something. He grew up pretending to be a Kennedy—sailing, horseback riding, golfing, and, of course, tennis. They had summer homes and yachts and everything. Completely in that stereotype. My dad wasn't—his family was, his background was. He married my mom, had me and then Caroline, and he started me on tennis when I was like four to spend time with me after Mom had Caroline. We have pictures of me from back then, with the other little girls I played with. They had names like mine, Helen Louise Davies and Sylvia Sloane-O'Henry and Marguerite Dickinson. But they were all the whitest, wASPiest girls you've ever seen, and I'm in the middle, too tall and knobby-kneed, and of course, half-black." She laughed, a big gut laugh, and Grace smiled. "Anyways, he started me out. After he died, I refused to play, actually. Mom made me restart after we moved out here. She said it'd be good for me, and I guess it has." She had a crooked smile, Grace noted, "What do you think of Vegas?"

Grace shrugged. "It's—actually, it's one of the weirdest concepts ever. The whole town is built around gambling. Everything ties into it. There's no infrastructure. It's just odd. Gambling and tourism." She giggled. "It's a ridiculous concept, I know. But—it just feels that way. What do your parents do?"

Charlotte rolled her eyes and smiled. "You're going to love me. Mom's in the tourism—that's marketing in Vegaspeak—department at the Bellagio. And my stepfather runs a security-consulting company that caters to the casinos."

"See, exactly my point." The girls laughed amicably. Grace looked at her watch. "I actually told Sara that I'd be home at about six, which was totally about forty-five minutes ago. I'd better go."

"Who's Sara?" Charlotte rose, brushing the table with her palm.

"She's my mother's cousin. She's who we're living with now."

"Your cousin? She cool?"

"Yeah—pretty much. We're getting along. She's—she's been there, she—Sara's just good, I guess. She's trying as hard as she can. We're—we're getting along. I think we're adjusting." Grace suddenly felt exhausted. "Anyways. That was random. So I'm going to get going."

"Cool." Charlotte said. "Hey—if you're not busy Saturday night, a bunch of us are going to karaoke at this bar. I mean, we're not _drinking_ or anything—it's just this little karaoke bar that we sometimes go to. There's going to be about eight or nine of us. I promise they're not all juniors. If you want to go, just give me a call. Your sister's invited too."

"Thanks," Grace said. "I've never been to karaoke."

"You should definitely come then. It's pretty sweet. We have a lot of fun. What's your cell number?" they traded phone numbers, waved goodbye. Grace watched Charlotte pull cleanly into the flow of traffic before following.


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer in part one.

I decided to update, even though it's only been 2 days, in honor of the fact that in the story, it's Jules and Grace's birthday. (I'm a dork, I know.) More sturm and drang, just stay with me... It will pick up eventually I promise.  
Thanks! Please review!

* * *

"It was a total bust. We're _totally_ behind in _ev_erything." Jules complained loudly, snapping a carrot with zest. "There was this college essay unit in English, _plus_ we're halfway through _Crime and Punishment_. And, yeah, I've read it before—but that's not the point. Plus, we got assigned books for the independent critical analysis project! _Assigned!_ I got _Their Eyes Were Watching God, _she got _The Awakening. _Thank god I didn't get that one.And you were right—missing two weeks of calculus sucks. Mr. Annoli has set us up with this junior wunderkind for a tutor. God, I bet he's ugly. And pimply. How are you possibly better than seniors at calculus unless you're ugly? It was all sucky." Looks usually didn't bother Jules; in fact, she was more apt to approve of people who didn't look too pretty. She was merely in a vicious mood.

"It couldn't have _all _been sucky." Sara tried to reason.

"Yes. It was. Can I graduate early?"

"And do what." Sara set the butcher knife next to her. "Sit around the house? Wait till college comes around?"

"Backpack around Europe." Jules suggested. "Where's Grace?"

"She's at tennis." Sara said.

"Still?"

"I guess?" Sara said. "Just call her cell or something."

As Jules was dialing, Grace waltzed into the kitchen. "Where were you?" Jules demanded.

"Quit being so snippy." Grace said. "I went to get smoothies with this girl from the tennis team. We—talked."

"Just call next time, okay?" Jules said vehemently.

"Sit your ass down and quit talking to me like that; I'm older, you know." Grace sounded peeved.

"Girls, please," Sara said exasperatedly, hoping that her tone was enough and she wouldn't have to get in the middle of an actual argument. "Grace, please—just…try to call. Alright?"

"Yeah. Sorry." Grace looked slightly chastised. "What's for dinner?"

Sara brightened. "Spaghetti, with this special sauce that I found a recipe for today in your mother's stuff. I've been simmering it since about four, actually. There's all sort of vegetables: carrots and mushrooms and peppers and olives and onions and everything. And there's a cake in the oven; a three-layer mocha-almond cake with espresso in the frosting."

"Wow—you're like spoiling us." Grace said carefully.

"Yeah. Nick and I were thinking: I'll cook tonight, and then we'll go out like Saturday night."

"Actually, I got invited to karaoke night with Charlotte. The girl from tennis." Grace looked sideways at her twin. "You're invited too. Saturday night."

Jules wrinkled her nose. "I hate singing. Everyone laughs at me."

"Well, think about it." Sara set down her knife. "We can go out a different night; it doesn't matter." She looked back and forth. "And girls—can we talk, about Nick?"

"What about him?" Grace said quizzically. "You still like him, right?" she sounded slightly horrified.

"Yes. That's what—that's what I actually wanted to talk to you about. How—how comfortable are you with Nick? How much Nick do you want to see?"

"Well, while I'm sure he looks great in boxers or even less, I don't wanna see _that_." Grace joked.

"Girls—really. How…we don't want to make you uncomfortable in any way. " But—we are dating. We'd like to do dating things."

"Well, you've already had sex with him, right? I mean, how much more 'dating' can you get?" Jules grinned, taking a head of lettuce out of the fridge to make a salad.

This was precisely the conversation Sara had wished to avoid. "Girls—don't think about _that_ aspect. Nick and I are dating, and will continue to date, but how much are you comfortable observing?"

"Well, we wouldn't like to hear the orgasms through the wall or anything." Grace looked slightly sick. Jules just looked amused.

"Girls—please get your minds out of the gutter." Sara said sternly. "Are you alright with him coming over after work or being here when you get home from school and everything? And if we fight, it might be here. And you guys—okay with it, I guess?"

"Sara—please. You're not—you're not Mom. The concept of you having a sex life doesn't make us squirm. It's not going to gross us out if you have him spend the night." Grace's look of sickness turned in to one of pain when she mentioned her mother.

Sara picked up the knife again. "Alright." She said quietly. "In any case, he's coming over for dinner."

"Sara—we're really fine with it. You're dating. You're thirty-five. You're like a roommate with grounding privileges or something. You're having sex. We didn't expect that you're still a virgin at your age. In fact, we _hope _that you're having sex; it's supposed to make people be happier and easier to get along with. If you want, put a hanger on your door or something. And don't do the sneaking around crap, 'cuz that's really weird. And don't have like a line of men outside your bedroom. That would be weird too. But everything else is fine. And if it's not fine, we're going to tell you." Jules began shredding the lettuce with her fingers.

"Okay. I have a crap-ton of calculus." Grace breezed upstairs. "I'm going to study. Call me when it's ready."

"You're getting tutored too, right?"

"Yeah," Grace turned back around. "I met him already, actually. In the library during lunch, he's a library assistant during that hour. Anyways. Ethan McKellar. He's a junior, _and he's British_." Her voice betrayed her obvious excitement at him. "Honestly, I can't believe we didn't notice him earlier, Julesie. He's actually kind of hot, in a nerdy, Elijah Wood way. He took the BC test last year, as a sophomore, and so now he's tutoring for Mr. Annoli and taking extension math classes through Stanford. He's really ahead since he moved here from LA two years ago, and he'd been at some really tony magnet school there or something."

"I thought he was British?"

"Oh, he is. Totally. He's sixteen and moved to LA from London when he was ten. His older half-brothers went to Eton. One of them graduated with Prince William! Anyways, Mr. Annoli gave him our numbers and he's supposed to contact us sometime soon. Probably like tonight or tomorrow. We really need to get caught up, ya know."

"Yeah." Jules said faintly. "Do we want this to be a Caesar salad?" Grace rolled her eyes at her twin's seeming lack of interest and disappeared up the stairs.

"Caesar's good. So now calculus tutoring might not be such a bust after all. I can help you too, you know. Physics has a lot of calculus in it."

"Yeah. Sure. If this math tutor can't help or anything…" Jules was obviously off, thinking about the genius British math tutor. "I think I should go see whether Grace understands the calc, at any rate. The salad's done. Call us for dinner." She slid off her stool and walked out.

Sara stood alone, chopping vegetables and singing to herself, and then heard Nick pull into the driveway. "Hey, darlin," he drawled as he let himself in the back door. "I brought breadsticks." He swung a plastic bag onto the counter, put his hands on her hips, and started to kiss her neck.

"Great. Try this." She pooled a little sauce onto the wooden spoon, cupped her hand underneath it, and lifted it above her shoulder.

"Mmm. Mnnh." Nick said. "Delicious. Homemade? I'm impressed."

"Shut up," she elbowed him gently. "I aced classes like chemistry; I can cook. I just don't show off my talent all the time. I found this recipe in a box of Lilly's stuff this afternoon, when you were tied up at work and the girls were at school."

"Didn't you sleep?" he asked worriedly.

"Yes. Of course I did. And after I slept, I found this recipe. I think it was Grandma Sarai's. It was in the same box as the recipes for Seder dinner."

"You're Jewish?" Nick said confusedly. "I didn't know that."

"I'm not. My mother was, for a while. She and Dad renounced religion shortly before Troy was born. Dad wasn't Jewish; he was some sort of Lutheran or something. We weren't religious or anything. Aunt Maggie was from a good Catholic family—I mean, her full name is Mary Margaret Connelly. She raised the kids Catholic, since Uncle Nathan didn't care, but Lilly renounced Catholicism when she went to college, and eventually became Presbyterian around the time her girls were born and she and Thom started going downhill. Grandma Sarai died when I was eleven or so—but for the few years I knew her, it was awesome. We'd get Chanukah presents from her, and Christmas presents from our parents."

"Greedy." He teased.

"More like opportunistic." She replied. "Come on, what are you?"

She could feel him shrug. "Depends. My parents are Methodists, as are most of my siblings. Close enough?"

"I guess. I have to find a church or something for the girls. They're Presbyterian. They want a church. I don't know churches."

"It'll work out. Just look one up in the Yellow Pages." Nick reached for a crouton perched on top of the lettuce.

"Quit eating. My masterpiece sauce is almost done." She carefully stirred it a little more. "I talked to the girls about going out on Saturday—Grace apparently got invited to a karaoke night with this girl from her tennis team. So, that's out. Maybe Friday? And, anyways, I found out their birthday. It's November 22nd. We could always just wait until then. I don't know what to do for that—how are we supposed to celebrate? And, also, I think it's the night before Thanksgiving this year. Are we supposed to do anything for Thanksgiving? But they seemed pretty okay tonight. They have a hot British math tutor or something. Grace is excited, at least." She tasted the sauce. "I think it's done. Do you want to get the table set?"

"Yeah. Sure." He kissed her neck again and went to find the myriad dishes and placemats.

She arranged the breadsticks in a straw basket of Lilly's, even wrapped them in a clean dishtowel. Feeling very domestic, slightly ridiculous, and vaguely fraudulent, she yelled, "Girls! Dinner!" up the stairwell, and heard two sets of pounding come towards her.

Both girls had changed into Soffe shorts and sweatshirts; Grace had taken her hair out of its ponytail and was rebrushing it. Jules looked like she'd been getting ready for a quick rinse: hint of cold cream were smudged around her hairline and she'd carefully used tons of bobby pins to clip back all of her short hair. They slid into their seats as Nick poured drinks and Sara carefully drizzled her sauce over the flat fettuccini-style noodles. Grace jumped up to find a fleece blanket she'd made; she returned to the table with it cocooned around her. Finally, all four of them sat at the table. They looked at each other awkwardly. "Can we say the blessing?" Grace muttered, looking carefully at her fingernails.

Sara didn't say anything, remembering the girls' groans whenever their mother had requested that one of them bless the food. "I'll do it." Jules said, shooting a look that was both aching for approval and defiant towards Sara. Sara quickly nodded, and Jules sucked in her breath before quickly folding her hands, staring at the salad bowl, and saying, "_Dear Lord, Bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies and us to thy service. In Christ's name we pray, Amen._" in one big rush. She grabbed the salad bowl and the tongs, and quickly plopped some lettuce onto the plate before passing it left to Sara. Nick looked at Sara, cleared his throat, and began putting noodles on his plate before passing it to Jules. Grace had taken two of the eight breadsticks and prayed that Jules would only have one, like usual, so she could have the extra one. Grace passed the basket on to Nick, and slowly the food made its way around the table in complete silence, save for the metallic scratches of silverware.

"How was your case, Nick?" Grace finally asked. "Did you get it solved?"

"No, we're a little stuck." Nick sounded distant and stymied, his mind back at the lab. "The DNA wasn't the husband's, wasn't her boyfriend's. The two sons were extremely angry with her, since they'd just found out about the affair, but it wasn't a relationship to the father and neither boy was adopted. There wasn't a break-in either, though, so we're going through and interviewing neighbors and that's all we've got." He looked at both girls. "What'd you do in school today?"

"Got a lecture from the headmaster and a lot of pitying looks." Jules said. "It sucked."

Grace slammed her fork down on her plate so hard that a chip of china sprang from it. "Jules, I am so _sick_ of you saying crap like this! Could you _please_ be a little more pleasant? Or positive! Quit being so _negative_. You're always so _down_ and depressed and you're always assuming the worst! You're freaking out. Quit it. Calm down!"

"Well, ex_cuse_ me." Jules said. "I mean, God for_bid_ that I get upset when people treat me like a freak! I'm normal! So are you, except you're just burying everything! Don't you _get_ it? Mom died! She's dead, Gracie, and nobody is going about being sympathetic correctly!" Jules' eyes swelled with unshed tears. "And here you are, pretending everything's _normal_, like it's always been this way! It hasn't. It's new and I'm scared and you're not and I want to know why!"

"I _am_ reacting! Just because I don't fly off the handle and bitch at everyone and say, 'poor me, pity me, but not that way,' doesn't mean I'm not feeling anything! I'm just handling it _maturely_!"

"No, you're _handling_ it with denial and acting like an emotionless android who just wants to _look_ like she's got it together so that nobody _asks _you any questions or _brings _up the subject! You can show emotion, you know!"

"Hey! Girls!" Sara yelled. "Now is _not_ the time to be psychoanalyzing each other." She looked at them plaintively, almost pathetically. "Please—just _talk_ things out. Don't yell. Today's been extremely stressful, I can tell. You're reacting differently, which is normal since you're different people. But, God, quit yelling at each other. And quit being so _damn_ judgmental about who's grieving more. Let's talk _after dinner_ and then you're going to joint sessions with Margaret."

Almost comically, Nick's cell phone began to trill an annoyingly upbeat rhythm. "Yeah—sorry," he muttered, twisting around to retrieve it from the counter. "It's Grissom," he told Sara before standing and walking to the corner. Grace looked down at her hands; Jules sighed heavily and started spinning spaghetti. "Yeah? Really? Okay? Give me…about a half hour. Alright." He turned back. "Grissom—he thought of another possibility. The sons might not be the father's, we're interviewing all of them. I have to go in." He put his hand on Sara's shoulder, kissed her good-bye, and said, "Dinner was great. I'll call you when I'm done; it might not take too long."

"Nah, I'll just see you at work. I have to go in early anyways." Sara replied. "Do you want to take anything? We just sat down."

"No, thanks. I'll be fine. What I had was delicious though." He squeezed her shoulder, and she absentmindedly patted his hand. "See you girls later."

"Bye, Nick," Grace said tiredly, while Jules just mumbled a goodbye underneath her breath.

"Why are you going into work early?" Jules asked as soon as Nick had left. "I thought you didn't have a case." Her voice was accusatory and her eyes were betrayed.

"I—don't. I just need to talk to Grissom. I need my schedule adjusted."

"What for?" Grace asked.

Sara picked at her napkin. "I'm actually going to try to reduce my hours and go down to three nights a week and four on call instead of five and two."

"Why?" Jules said bluntly.

"Well, to be around here. It freaks me out to leave you guys alone, so—this is the best compromise. I can still work my shift but I can try and be here, too."

"Oh," Grace said softly. "And Grissom will go for this?"

Sara shrugged. "I think so. I'm good at pleading. Why?" she sighed. "This was supposed to be a good thing, you both seem upset."

They looked at each other. "Nothing, really." Grace said. "Just—I—I don't know."

"Jules?"

She shrugged. "Just… more changes, I guess. Everything just moves so damn quickly. I hate reality. Being a grown-up used to sound like so much fun but it just keeps getting suckier." She got up. "I really have a ton of homework which I have not started. "I'll be in my room."

"Kay," Sara said, deflating a little. Neither girl had eaten much. "Are you done, too, Grace? We have cake."

She shook her head, carrying her plate to the sink. "No, thank you. I don't think I can hold cake down. It's too rich right now. It was wonderful, Sar." She said. "Thank you." She had tears in her eyes. She followed her sister out of the kitchen.

Sara put her head on her hands. Teenagers sucked. And so much for a nice, relaxing dinner.


	8. Chapter 8

Wow, everyone, it's been awhile. At first, I was just totally swamped with a major research paper(if anyone ever wants to know anything about local color or Kate Chopin, email me) but then I wasn't too sure about where I was going or where I wanted to go with this. I'm still not certain, but I really want to see it through, so please stick it out.

Thanks for reading/reviewing.

Disclaimer in part one.

* * *

Sara threw her keys on the counter and stretched. Shift had been boring; no new cases had come in so she had helped Nick on his. She had talked to Grissom, who seemed surprised at her compromise but readily agreed to talk to Ecklie about the reduced-hours plan.

Jules walked into the kitchen. "Morning." She said. Sara felt like an idiot, because it felt so late for her, but she mumbled a reply. "Where's Nick?" Jules pulled a glass from the cabinet.

"He's still at work. Grissom's theory that the sons might not be the husband's biological children panned out. The youngest son was the result of an affair with a coworker. He didn't know. They're interviewing him right now."

"Freaky." Jules commented. Swallowing her orange juice, she continued, "Anyways. Swim practice, tennis practice after school—yada yada yada. Are you getting all this down in your BlackBerry?" When she saw Sara's guilty look, she exclaimed, "Sara! You need to start doing that. It will make everything a lot easier."

"Yes, ma'am." Sara said, scouring the cabinets.

"Okay. Also, Ethan called, and he's coming over tonight at seven to get a schedule and stuff set up. Anyways, when Grace was talking to him—turns out he's friends with her tennis friend Charlotte, too, so we're all doing Karaoke Saturday night."

"When did he call?"

"Last night. After you left."

"I left at a quarter till ten."

"We're in high school, do you think we abide by a set bedtime?"

"If I'm leaving you home alone I think that you do. And at least no phone calls past a certain hour."

"Please, Sar. We don't go to bed until past eleven, and no other high schooler does either. And anyways, we'll always have our cell phones charging by our beds, so that people can call us."

"You think people will call you at 2 AM on a school night?" Sara said skeptically.

Jules shrugged. "Anything's possible. We're being communication Boy Scouts."

"Always prepared?" Sara questioned wryly.

"Pretty much." Jules rummaged around for a banana.

"Where's Grace?"

"In the shower."

"Okay. I'm going to call up Margaret today to make you two an appointment together, what time would you like it?"

"An appointment together?" Jules sounded mystified, which annoyed Sara—hadn't Jules been present at that argument?

"Yeah. So you two can work on stuff together. I'm also going to talk to her about local support groups. I think you need to get involved."

Jules shook her head. "We'll be fine, we were just fighting."

Sara shook her head with more force than Jules. "I still think you two need to do some joint stuff. You're both feeling isolated, but grouped together, and alone. It's freaky-feeling. I think you just need some reassurance before you do some permanent damage."

"No, I really don't think we do. Look, Gracie and I will fight—we're just different people, twins or no twins—and right now we're both really stressed and stuff, but our relationship won't be permanently damaged—we can get mad at each other because we love each other, and everything will turn out okay. We don't need to go to Margaret, and have our hands held, and hug each other to know that."

"But it wouldn't hurt, so you're going. And you both still have individual appointments."

"Whatever." Jules broke eye contact.

"I'm _serious_ Jules, your mother was very specific about that. And didn't you hear me say this last night?

"Well, yeah, but I thought it was just you yelling and stuff. And Mom said _If we needed it_, and right now it's too soon to tell if we need it."

"Never too early." Sara said. She briefly thought back to all her time on the Couch. She personally hated therapy, the intrusive questions and gazes loaded with meaning. But if she had started earlier, maybe she wouldn't be so screwed up. That was Lilly's thought process, too; Sara was going to bank on it. "Jules, please don't argue about this."

"Why?" Jules said curtly. "Why not?"

"This isn't something you can help. Right now we're taking every instruction Lilly left and treating it like it was written on Moses' tablets." Sara suddenly felt very tired, and had a maniacal, almost animalistic urge to cry.

"I'm serious. Therapy is ridiculous. You made it _fine _without therapy, and your mother killed your father!" Jules' voice escalated into a crescendo before cutting off immediately, leaving a ringing, loaded silence.

"Look behind you." Sara said flatly. Mute, Jules twisted in a circle. "See that line? The one you just crossed?"

Jules's face twisted as she tried to explain, but Sara cut her off. "This is one of those things where I'm _trying_ to do what is best. Maybe—much as I hate to admit it—maybe some therapy would have helped me. You don't want to end up like me, Jules. Dysfunctional, anxious, married to work, constantly chasing inappropriate men whom I know I don't have a chance with, just to purposely screw something up? Unable to have a steady, personal friendship; unable to invest myself into something like a healthy relationship? Not being able to accept something that's good—instead, having a raging compulsion to make it go bad? Here—with you and Grace and now, weirdly, Nick—is the first time I haven't fought or flown in a very long time." She stared at the stricken teen and licked her lips, "Things have consequences, really, truly. You say something or do something because you're willful and you feel like it and it seems okay, because someone will always be there, but that's not what always happens. Maybe it's in the _path_ you're supposed to take, or whatever you and Grace believe, that this relationship shouldn't last, because that's life, but you need to realize things before the little things turn big and then they are too big, because maybe it's not the right path—maybe you screwed yourself, and using the excuse that it wasn't on your path is honestly just a cop-out. You and Grace are traumatized right now—I know trauma, sweetheart, don't deny it. And you need help. Accept it; take it when it's offered. Because one day it won't be, and by then you _will _have needed it." She looked away. "Just go with it. I'll set the appointment up. And you're going."


	9. Chapter 9

Whew, I bet you all thought I dropped off the earth, huh? Just a disclaimer: I haven't watched _CSI _in a while, and don't really enjoy the show anymore, but just felt like writing. So I'm not sure when updates will happen. Still, enjoy this.

Regular disclaimer in part one.

* * *

Jules entered the house and inhaled. She knew that smell. She hadn't smelled that smell in several weeks, but it was as familiar and comfortable as her favorite pair of slippers that were perfectly molded in the shape of her feet. Taking off her shoes, she headed in the direction of the kitchen.

Grace was sitting at the table, pouring over a calculus book. Various baking paraphernalia was strewn on the counter. A large mixing bowl had a spatula staked in it and was sitting by the stove, next to a stack of cookie sheets. That's where Jules headed. She and Grace had this down to a ritual: Grace mixed the dough; Jules ate the dough and put the rest of the dough on the trays. Using two fingers to swipe some dough, she smiled satisfactorily as the chocolate chips crunched and sat next to her sister.

"Rain in Vegas, who woulda thought?" Grace said, looking up. "Do you understand _why_, exactly, a chain rule works? Hell, why derivatives to find _slope _work? Or what a derivative does? How to use any of this?"

"No. You're not supposed to understand it. That's why we're getting tutored. Why did you make cookies? And Sara said this rain is seriously a once a year thing. Where is she?"

"Work. She hasn't been home all day. And tennis got cancelled because of the rain, so I made cookies for Ethan."

"When's he coming?" Jules got up to get more cookie dough. Realizing that the timer was almost ready to go off, she started rolling lumps and placing them on the next cookie pan.

"About twenty or thirty more minutes. I just don't want to seem like an idiot."

"Calm down."

"It's different for you. You're the history-and-English person. I'm the math person."

"You're like the biology-art-anatomy person; you hated physics. And chemistry. There was too much math in them."

Her sister gave her a hard look. "It's different for me. I'm going into engineering. All of the subjects I like require calculus. This stuff might _matter_ some day."

"Calm down. It'll be fine. Do you want to order something? Is Sara getting home soon?"

"She said she'd be awhile. She's just happy to have a mildly interesting case. That's how she termed it."

"We got in a fight this morning."

"What?" Grace asked. "When?"

"You were in the shower—or something, I don't know. And we got into a fight about going to therapy."

Grace's eyes hardened reflexively. "Lemme guess… you don't want to go, she's forcing you."

"Yeah. I mean, it's my life, it should be my choice." Jules insisted.

Grace rolled her eyes. "Please. You're _totally_ crying out for therapy. You act completely hysterical, and then are like, 'no, don't send me, I don't need it' when Sara tried to help. I mean, come on. You know you're doing it."

Jules felt stung. "What do you mean, acting completely hysterical? Like, oh, I've _lost_ my mother or something?'

Grace's eyes flickered again. She really had the most expressive eyes. "Jules, please stop trying to criticize the way I deal with things. I'm really trying."

"So am I, alright? Just… be my sister. The one that I recognize." Jules pleaded. She sat down again. "This is so scary."

Grace gave her a patented 'duh' look. "Jules—please. Just please. I love you, arlight? I just don't think you're behaving in constructive ways. So, maybe, you know, this would help."

"Whatever. _You_ need it just as much as I do. She was your mother, too. _I'm_ worried about _you._" Jules said. Before Grace could say anything, Jules stood and continued, "I feel very slobby from the pool; I'm going to go change."

Ten minutes later, she was back downstairs in a strappy tank, low-slung drawstring yoga pants, and an exposed sports bra. She had blow-dried her hair, and Grace knew that she had applied mousse and bedhead wax in order to make it look natural. "Aren't you cold?" Grace hadn't moved except to move the cookie baking along.

"Please. We live in Vegas." Jules moved to the stove. "The cookies look wonderful. Maybe we should do the tutoring in the living room?"

"Good idea." Grace nodded. "This is a mess."

"Whose fault is that?" Jules' voice was light; teasing. They had always been wonderful at bantering.

"It's your job to eat the cookie dough and clean up." Grace countered, gathering her math things. She looked at her sister, and then looked at her school uniform, wrinkly on her body. "Fine. I'm changing too." Jules grinned and started wiping down the mixing bowl.

Just as she was angling the last cookie pan into the dry side of the sink, the doorbell rang. Wiping her hands on her ass, she adjusted her tank top straps for maximum "I'm looking really relaxed but hot" potential. "I got it, Grace." She yelled upstairs. She crossed the living room.

Opening the door, she was a little surprised at Ethan's appearance. She hadn't met him yet, but they'd talked on the phone. She knew that he was coming straight from soccer practice. He still wore his muddy, grass- and god-knows-what-else-stained jersey, but his hair was clean and slightly damp, and he wore jeans. He had great eyes—sort of a glassy blue-green-gray. The color of mirrors. His hair was a dark chestnut and curled down over his ears, making him look almost boyish. He had a backpack with a loose strap slung over a shoulder. She felt a frisson run up and down her spine. She smiled widely.

"Hey," he grinned. His British accent was incredibly faint, but just detectable enough to make it hot. "I'm Ethan." He stepped inside. "You must be Jules; I've already met Grace."

"Yeah. Come—in." she was momentarily dazed, and shut the door behind him after realizing how dumb her comment was. "Grace is changing. Her tennis practice got cancelled because of the rain, so she's just slipping into something more comfortable."

"Yeah, our soccer practice should have been cancelled, but Greene's pretty much an asshole. I'm really sorry if I get it on your furniture or something."

"It's alright. Sara won't care about her stuff; the rest of it Grace and I own. Come on in. Grace made cookies this afternoon; when she gets bored she bakes. Are you hungry?"

"Yeah, cookies sound great. I haven't been able to eat dinner."

"We were thinking about ordering some Thai or something. Do you want something to drink?" she walked into the kitchen.

"Yeah, where are the glasses?" she turned to see him standing in the archway.

"Oh—that cabinet. We have Diet Dr. Pepper, Diet Coke, Diet Mountain Dew, and water and milk."

"You and your sister can't possibly thing you need a diet."

"No, but why waste the calories?" Jules reasoned, pulling a takeout menu magnet from the fridge. "What would you like?"

He came over, hunched over her shoulder. The fresh scent was heady. "Spicy Beef with Noodles." He said. "Let's get some spring rolls too."

"Good idea." She dialed, placed their orders. "Lemme go grab my calc book and everything."

"Sure." He followed her out of the kitchen and stopped by the mantel to check out the pictures as she grabbed her books.

She crept closer to him—he appeared to like the photographs. "That was taken at Disneyland, on the Teacups obviously. We were eleven. Thank god we grew up. Braces were a godsend."

"Aww, come on, you two were cute." He shrugged in the direction of another picture. "Where was that taken?"

Jules followed his glance to one taken the year the girls were eight. They were on the swing set they had just installed in their backyard. Both had been twisting their swings until the chains were knobs and they were laughing crazily. "Our backyard, at a barbeque we had for the neighbors that installed the swing set for us. We were eight. It was back when we lived where our house had trees in the backyard."

"Yeah, living here you can sometimes forget that they can come like that." Jules let her eyes drift over the pictures. She hadn't realized that Sara had obviously changed them in the past few weeks; more had been added. When Mom had decorated the mantel the day after the move-in, she had hardly put any of herself up. Now, there were several featuring all three of them.

"What are the rest of the pictures from?" he asked.

"You're certainly interested."

He grinned. "My mother is a photographer, my sister is a photojournalist. They have cameras with them all the time."

"Well, then, you're practically an art critic." She smirked and looked at the pictures. "Well, that one was taken when we were three—the day we started preschool." A younger, long-haired Lilly, wearing a business suit with shoulder pads, had a girl by each hand. They both wore knee-length flower print dresses that reached with wide peter pan collars and little ribbons around the waist—Grace's was black with little daisies on it and a yellow ribbon; Jules' was dark blue with pink roses with a pink ribbon. Grace had insisted on having very long hair, and it was wispy and stringy because it was so fine and she couldn't take care of it. Jules' hair, slightly darker than her sister's was back then, was cut at the chin and had very thick bangs. Sun angled behind them to give Lilly's hair an ethereal, angelic look. It was a split frame containing two photos; in the second one, the girls were sitting on their father's lap. Thom's face had a slightly dazed, vacant expression, and he wore a white undershirt and khakis. Mom had kicked him out two weeks later. "That's our father in the other picture." She quickly moved to the next picture, the one of Lilly and Sara from a long-ago Christmas. "That's a family portrait of our mother's family. That's her sister, my two uncles, my grandparents. That's my mother's sister; she died before we were born. That's Sara, mom's cousin and whom we're living with. That's Sara's brother Troy." She quickly pointed to the next photo to avoid questions. "That's prom last year, us with our dates and our mom. That's us on the first day of high school back in Sacramento. That one is from our sixth grade talent show, after it anyways. Grace and two other girls did a ballet dance and I played a piano duet." She scanned the rest. "That's Sara and her boyfriend Nick. It looks pretty recent." Sara and Nick were sitting together, their knees angled towards each other, his arm around her waist and her hand on his knee. Their heads were touching. Nick wore a crimson-colored shirt, and Sara had on a sparkly halter. "It kinda looks like a Christmas party picture last year. There's us with Mom when we were born—I actually don't know who is who in that picture—there's us in London" –she pointed to a picture of the three of them standing in a phone booth—"we were twelve that year. There's third grade, when we went to San Francisco; Christmas—I think we're in seventh or eighth grade—with our whole extended family. That split frame has photos from when we were ten, me in my suit and Grace with her tennis racket." Her eyes settled on the last photo and a lump caught in her throat. "That's us with Mom" her voice got thicker, "at the Hospice she stayed at. It…it looks about three or four days before she died." She looked down and swallowed before turning to him. "So, do they pass your critical eye?"

He looked started and out of place, before quickly saying, "Oh, yeah. Totally. You…have so many pictures out."

"They're all new. I guess Sara must have rearranged them a couple days ago. Grace and I found a bunch in Mom's old stuff, but I didn't know Sara put them up or anything." She tilted her chin, trying desperately to get off the subject. "So, your sister? A photojournalist? Where's she work? Does she do the whole war-torn Robert Capra thing?"

Ethan laughed. "You're actually sort of close. Kass was born in Africa when my father was working there, so she did do that for a while—she was in Zaire and the Congo and pretty much anywhere there was a civil war or a famine. She's always been pretty adventurous. She mostly freelanced or worked for photo agencies for five years, but now she's with the WHO doing photos and writing news releases about diseases in Africa. She's based in South Africa and Geneva; she has a one-year-old daughter named Viola, a three-year-old named Hermione and a five-year-old named Ariel."

"Shakespeare fan. What's your dad do?"

"He used to work for the British government; when I was ten he got transferred to the Consulate in L.A., promptly got out of the business and now is in private security. My mother's a photographer, portraits and weddings and things; she pretty much just follows him around. She used to be a photographer for magazines and worked on_ Vogue_ back home, but now she just runs a studio and sometimes has a gallery showing."

"Very cool." She smiled. "You have an exciting life."

He shrugged. "I don't know. It…just is what it is." He looked sideways at her. "That was kinda lame."

She giggled, covered her mouth with a hand and bending her elbows out so they resembled chicken wings. She always involuntarily did that when she laughed and she always was embarrassed by it. "A little bit." She admitted.

Just then, Grace appeared. She was wearing sleek drawstring capris, and a fitted long-sleeved from Stanford. "Hey, Ethan. Sorry for taking so long; I was changing and Charlotte called."

"No problem. Char's awesome. She lets me copy her English homework all the time."

"I keep forgetting that you're a junior." Grace remarked. She turned to her sister. "Anyways, she wants me to make sure that you're coming to karaoke Saturday night."

"She already asked that."

"Well, I guess she really means it."

"You should come." Ethan interjected. "I'm in that group. It sounds dorky but it's really fun."

Jules rolled her eyes, not ready to admit she'd go just because Ethan was going. "Fine. Whatever. I'll try anything once." She turned to her sister. "Did you know that Sara put up new photos? They're all new."

Grace shook her head. "No, she didn't. I did when I was bored this afternoon."

"Oh." This bugged Jules for some reason. "You have a good selection."

Grace shrugged. "I tried. Whatever. Let's get working." She maneuvered around the table. "Do you want cookies? And did we order dinner?"

"Yeah, we got Thai food. It should be delivered pretty soon. I got you rice and chicken satay." Jules shoved a bunch of brochures from Hospice underneath a pile of newspapers.

"Ooh, thanks. I was actually in the mood for Thai. Let me go grab my book and we'll get started." She flashed teeth at Ethan. "Thank you so much for doing this."

Jules turned to Ethan. "So….karaoke?"

He laughed. "It sounds really dorky, like something some out-of-touch adult would write for a wannabe John Hughes movie, I know, but it's really freaking awesome. Once we all dressed up and went to this piano bar, but most of the time it's this karaoke dive downtown. We just go there and make ourselves look absolutely idiotic. It's hilarious. It's so much fun."

"Sounds like it." Jules commented.

"What? You don't like singing?" his voice was light, playful.

"I'm tone-deaf. You'll have fun with me." She laughed.

Grace came back in, math book cradled on hip and a plate of cookies in hand. "Let's get started. This is obviously going to take a while." Her book's spine made a cracking noise when she opened it, and she giggled. "See? It agrees with me."

The doorbell rang again then, and Jules jumped up to get it. "Good timing—we can eat and work at the same time." She crossed, opened the door. "Hey," she said to the deliveryman, hungrily eyeing the white cartons with _Bangkok House_ printed on them stacked in his hands.

"24.80." he said, transferring the cartons to her.

"Here, let me pay for my part." Ethan offered, standing.

"No way. You're going to be here all night; it's the least that we can do. Grace do you have your purse?"

"Yeah, one sec." Together, the girls came up with a flat twenty-seven dollars, and thanked the deliveryman.

"Here—Spicy noodles and beef for you—Chicken satay with rice for you—and spicy ginger-peanut chicken for me." Jules divvied up the boxes, handed everyone a spring roll, and said, "Who wants the extra? They gave us four spring rolls."

"Here, Ethan, it's for you." Grace took it from Jules and plopped it in Ethan's lap.

"Thanks," he smiled at Jules. "Let's get working."

Two hours later, after showering him with profuse thanks, Jules and Grace shut the door behind Ethan. Sighing, with her hand still on the doorknob, Grace said, "I think he likes you."

"What?" Jules leaned against the door. "You're kidding."

"No. When he grabbed your math book and wouldn't give it back? Totally flirting. And you weren't much better."

"Excuse me?"

"Please, Jules. I heard you squeal a couple of times. And you giggled. Both are atypical Jules behavior."

"I squealed?" Jules said slowly, heart thudding.

"Yeah. And he ate it up." Grace smiled encouragingly. "I don't like him or anything…this won't be a repeat of Matt Horace. Go for it. Have some fun." Grace walked towards the stairs. "God knows you need it. I have to finish _The Awakening_. I'm locking myself in my room till either Edna kills herself or I kill myself—whichever comes first."

"Kay." Jules followed her sister upstairs and locked herself in her room. She flopped sideways onto her bed. "He likes me." She whispered. Suddenly, silent tears started to wrack her body. She didn't know why.


	10. Chapter 10

Hello, readers! Here's another installment! I'm still not sure where this is going—well, I know where it's going, but I don't know if I'm going to finish it. I haven't watched the show in quite a while, and I have high school graduation and lots other funs things to do right now. But, please read and review! It honestly will help me write.

Disclaimer in Part 1.

The lines in italics are transitions; they happen in both conversations.

* * *

"Hi. I have an appointment at twelve."

Vicki swiveled around in her chair and stared up at the slender, pretty teenager standing awkwardly in her doorframe. She beamed. "You must be Grace Lowry."

"Yes. Grace stepped in, patting her hair. "I'm sorry, my sister couldn't make it—she had a thing." Grace stared critically at the thin, tan woman in front of her. She looked at least forty, but her makeup was perfect and her hair was long and blown-out. Neither of these things made her look any younger; instead, they made her look like she was trying too hard to be younger.

"Oh, that's just fine. It's better to do these separately, so you can both get more individualized advice. Here. Let me get out your folder." She shuffled through papers to find the slim vanilla folder. Opening it, she found three sheets of paper: a transcript from Hilliard High School; a letter from Dianne Tyler, guidance counselor at Hilliard High School; and an SAT score report from the Collegeboard with several scores on it. "Well, this is an extremely strong start." Vicki said, sounding surprised. "760 Math, 720 Writing, and 730 Critical Reading? Those are excellent scores, especially considering that you only took them once."

"Thank you." Grace said. "Mom made us take them back in May…" her voice trailed off a little before resuming its timbre, "and then made us study to the bone."

"Your PSATs are quite good too." Vicki seemed to be talking more to herself than anyone else. "And a 700 on the French SAT II? That's quite high; for a non-native speaker that's extraordinary. Plus, a 770 on Chem, a 760 on Math Level 2, and a 790 on Bio…I'd say that you're quite well-set."

"Thank you." Grace said. "Mom made us take the SAT II as soon as we were done with the subject; I took Bio my sophomore year in May and I took the French test in January last year, and then I took those last two in June."

"These are extremely good statistics." Vicki said confidently, putting the file to the side. "However, I need more information… we have a lot of ground to make up, you know. What are your interests?'

"My interests?" Grace asked.

"Yes. Career interests."

"Oh. Well, I wasn't sure if you met, you know, extracurriculars or something. My career interests? Well, I don't really know about _careers_. I really like art and design classes, but I'm really good at biology and chemistry and calculus, too, so I was thinking—maybe biomedical engineering. But I'm not totally sure, so I don't want to pick a college because of that program. It has to have other things, too. I mean, I like English class a lot too, and I liked psychology. But other factors have to be there, too."

"Like?" prompted Vicki.

"Well, I want it to be very…collegey feeling. I want a campus. It needs to be in a college town-type of area; my sister wants a city or something but I don't really. I'd like a nice art program or something. It can't be just a math-and-science school like MIT or CalTech or anything like that."

"You seem like a very thoughtful, intelligent girl." Vicki observed. "Surely you've thought out where you might like to be?"

Grace seemed to struggle internally for a little bit. "Yeah. Sort of. Back a while ago—I haven't really thought about _next year_ for, oh, about six months. But I really liked Duke. And Washington. And Stanford. And Northwestern. Cornell or Johns Hopkins. Dartmouth I really like. University of Michigan, but only their Honors program. Though Washington and Northwestern aren't really in college campusy places, but there's enough of a _campus_, you know." She shrugged, and raised and then dropped her hands into her lap. "I honestly don't know."

"Well, we have a start." Vicki leaned backwards. "College town, with an engineering school but definitely with other programs to offer, and probably high-ranking academically." She swallowed. It really was so vague. "I'm going to give you some homework. You don't need to pick a major; we'll find you a school with strong programs in all of these things. But I do want you to look into about ten schools that you think you might want to go to—including a safety—and we'll meet again the day after tomorrow. Also, call the teachers in California that will be writing your letters of recommendation. We have to get moving."

_"Alright." She said. Biting her lip, she continued, "You know—I'd just like you to know, I'm normally way more independent. These last few months, though—they've just been hard. But I can handle things. I was going to handle things."_

Margaret looked up from her notes with a skeptical, eyebrow-raised look. "I know. We've established that, Jules." The teenager was sitting, legs crossed and twisted over each other, on the armchair in Margaret's office. The sudden burst of words was out of left field—Jules had been in her office for nearly an hour, willfully dodging Margaret's probing questions with short, brief answers. Margaret usually tried to ease into the heavy stuff, like grief and sadness, but Jules was taking forever, defiantly telling Margaret about school, her hot calculus tutor, and the fact that she didn't need therapy. Margaret had finally given up and suggested an appointment next week. She had lied to Jules, had said this session was ending because Jules was doing great.

"I just wanted to reiterate it," Jules' tongue fumbled around her thoughts, "You've only known me these past few months…I used to be a lot different. I was spunky. I had a lot of spunk and was really sarcastic and funny and I wasn't sad all the time. I wasn't this washed-out, dried-up, depressed wallflower. I was intimidating. I was strong and funny and knew what I was doing and where I was going. I had my awkward moments, of course, but I wasn't depressing."

Margaret looked at her sympathetically. "What brought this confession on?"

Jules was fidgety, a clear sign she was nervous. "I don't know. I'm so confused. I just…. And nervous, I guess, finally. When I get nervous I ramble. Especially when it's quiet. And it was quiet and I was nervous so I started rambling about how confused I am." She stood and reached for her bag, but Margaret put her hand up.

"I don't think you're confused." Margaret said gently. "Confused means you don't understand, you can't grip things like a ball in your hands. You have a handle on things. But you're lost. You're drifting." The last sentence was pure guess.

Jules' eyes were defiant and raw. "Yes. Lost is a very good word." She looked down. "I don't feel very connected to anything, right now." She waited until Margaret nodded her affirmation. Margaret was an excellent bereavement counselor; she knew when to hold her tongue and let the patient ramble. "I guess it's part of moving. The people we'd been friends with for thirteen years, the neighbors who cared, the church members that prayed for us every day…we lost them all. All I have is Grace. And Sara, and then Nick, sort of. It's…I guess it is lost. But…things should work out. Mom said that they would. And I'm a rational person, and I have faith, and I knew things would work out. But…they're…not. Or I suppose they're working out differently." She sighed, twisted her hands, and tried a different approach. "I'm always the one asking _Why _or _What if_. So when Mom got so sick, I started….this sounds horrible, I know it does…I started to prep, I guess that would be the word, myself. I started imaging how I would react in different situations, how Grace would react, what would happen. I knew there would be really rocky times, but we would have each other and then it would be like some movie, and there would be some unknown moment of gratification—not gratification really—release. Yeah. Where everything would come together, and we would be uplifted and renewed and we would know that Mom was still there. We'd have some honest, teary confessions that we'd bond over. I figured we'd have some big, biblical trial right before that tearfest bonding, and our relationships would withstand them, and become stronger, and it would be this wonderful, bittersweet ending—where we knew that we still loved Mom, but that she also loved us, and that enabled us to moved on." Her eyes and voice dropped, and she mumbled something Margaret interpreted as, "I thought there _would _be an ending."

"Jules," Margaret used her softest, gentlest, most rational therapist voice. "Jules, it's only been a month since your mother died, and two weeks since you went back to school. Your swim team's starting, you are under a lot of stress from school. And you're probably a little correct; it wasn't the greatest idea to move your senior year, away from everyone you knew, as your mother was dying. She had her doubts about this, believe me, and she thought that you and Grace were strong enough to handle it. She thought you two were already very grown-up, just needed someone to corral you in the right direction and be a rock if you needed one. But you need to forgive her, and move on with things. You need to give things time. Have faith in your faith."

"I don't." she said shortly.

"You don't?" Margaret was a little surprised. "You've always been quite comfortable with spirituality in general. You firmly believed that your mother was going to Heaven. I hope you still do."

"I—I do." Jules struggled to articulate her feelings. "But—Grace and I tried church again last week. And church as an institution doesn't do it for me anymore. Religion, yes; God, yes. Church? No. Maybe if the church wasn't new, I don't know. And—Grace isn't reacting the way I thought Grace would react. She's fine. She's sweet and kind and interested in other people's lives and very responsible and everything she used to be. Why isn't she more raw?"

"Give her time. This isn't a movie. You're not being very patient." She scolded lightly. "You expect your resolution to the story to come an hour and a half after the funeral like it would in a movie. You expect things to be predictable. The movie in your head wouldn't win any Oscars. You have to give it more time."

"More time?" Jules repeated. "There is no ending—I just realized it yesterday, when we had to book hair appointments. There is no ending. We go on and on. Things feel normal but they're not normal. Is abnormal the new normal? The way pink is the new black? Do these things meld with time?"

"Yes. They do. They work out, you accept them, and then you get the resolution. And, things balance out in the end. Things happen for a reason. Don't fight it. It's natural. Just…let it flow."

"Have patience?" Jules said skeptically.

_"Yes. Patience. You've got to be patient. You're not letting things happen, you're trying to push them along. Just go with the flow, sit back, and have a little faith." She smiled. _

Sara sighed and pushed her hair back from her forehead. The locks were nasty—they had the texture of Vaseline. "Yes. I'm trying." She smiled up at Meredith, feeling ridiculous and defensive in her sweatpants and greasy hair, with her boyfriend in the shower. Meredith had forgotten Sara worked nights and she had needed to come check up on the girls' situation. "But, how long?" Sara nervously beat her heels against the stool.

"How long until what?" Meredith asked, going through the counters. Sara was annoyed. She bought food; she was capable of that.

"Until it slows down. Till the girls relax. I'm not asking for a set deadline, something written in stone…but I'd like some guidelines. So I know what to look out for."

Meredith gave her a confident smile. "You're doing fine. The girls are doing fine. Lilly's only been gone for about a month."

"She died on the 23rd of September." Sara confirmed.

"So, just a little over a month. The girls are doing fine. They'll get there. Just don't push things. The timeline—not a good idea, honey. Both of them will be different, reacting differently. Just watch them. They know each other better than you know them, too, so trust them."

"Yeah, I've sort of seen that. But they're both…growing…blooming is a better word…so quickly. Grace goes out almost every weekend with this friend from tennis, named Charlotte. They go shopping and to houses and rent movies and goof off and do things like that. And Jules has these three girlfriends from the swim team and the yearbook, and there's this junior who was…is tutoring both of them, that she likes a lot and they're hanging out on weekends now too. They're just growing so fast. Is that normal? Should they be doing that?"

Meredith smiled cheerily. "Perfectly normal—for teenaged girls."

"Is it a sign of repressed grief or something?"

Meredith saw the seriousness in Sara's tone and spoke gently. "I've talked to both of them. Honestly, Sara, they're coping. Are you three talking?" Sara nodded quickly. "That's all you really can do. Just keep on top of them. Everything will…happen the way it should. There's no set pattern for grief, no timeline. It's not like losing a spouse, when there's a social time limit for how long it's acceptable to wear black, or stay single. They will be grieving for many years, probably. But grief doesn't mean anything's wrong with them. It means they're normal."

"I hope so…I'm just worried. Right when she moved in, Lilly tried to give me a crash course in their personalities. Grace, she said, was more likely to be quiet and passive, to just take it and let it slowly consume her from inside; Jules was going to be over-the-top and very raw and barreling down some emotional roller coaster."

"And is that what you've seen?"

"For the most part, yes. So, I'm a little worried that it is affecting Grace more than she's letting on, and I'm worried Jules will just spin out of control. I'm afraid this might lead to depression or something with Grace."

"Again, just relax. It's still very fresh. Stay on top of things; stay vigilant. Keep appointments with Margaret, and I'll be around, of course. But keep them moving on with life—that will help, really it will. Now ,how are you doing?"

"Me?"

"Yes. You suffered a loss, you're now saddled with responsibilities you couldn't have imagined five months ago. How are you doing?"

"I'm fine—I guess. I haven't really thought about it. It's…just new, I guess. Tiring, but not horrible."

"How's Nick?"

"Nick's pretty good. We're extremely busy, but I'm trying. It's stressful. It's a start." Sara kept her lips shut. She didn't need Meredith knowing how much she worried about not being a good girlfriend, which was especially important to her, since she was trying and Nick was a great guy, but he obviously had issues of his own to work through. She worried she wasn't there enough for him.

"That's good. Make sure to take time for yourself, and for Nick. The girls are doing fine. I'm going to stop by in another week or so, and that time I'll talk to them."

Nick came into the kitchen, showered and shaved and fresh. He wore jeans and a faded red T-shirt and carried his jacket in his hands. "Hey, Meredith." He smiled, and she smiled back. Wrapping an arm around Sara's waist, its slimness obscured by a sweatshirt of his, he kissed her tenderly before saying softly, "I'm off to the clinic, again. I'll have a couple of errands to run, and then I'll call you."

"Kay," Sara nodded, smiling. "Talk to you later."

"He's off early." Meredith said, concerned, as soon as Nick had taken off. "Don't you guys work super-early?"

"Yeah, we got off at seven." Sara said. "We crash when we can. But he's got a standing therapy appointment—he was taken hostage about six months ago and buried alive—and everyone pretty much thinks continuing therapy was a good idea."

"Probably. Buried alive?" Meredith said, and Sara nodded. "Okay, how's their school work coming? Do they have their college applications done?"

"School work's going well. Grace had a meeting today with this college counselor woman at their school. Jules isn't really on top of things, but she knows where she's applying. They're both procrastinating there, I'll get on them."

"Where do they want to go?"

Sara ran a hand through her hair again, separating the strands. "Grace is thinking somewhere along the lines of Dartmouth, Duke, Stanford, and Cornell, and then she sort of liked Washington University in St. Louis. Maybe Johns Hopkins too? I don't know too much, her mind always seems to change. She is really thinking about biomedical engineering as a career, so she was looking for good engineering schools. Jules is looking into history or English programs. I haven't read any of her things, but everyone keeps telling me what an amazing writer she is. Lilly sort of wanted her to go into that. She really likes political science and history, though, too. But she's looking at Washington University in St. Louis, UPenn, Princeton, Columbia, Georgetown, and Yale."

"They're really pushing themselves." Meredith observed. "Do you think they'll be able to handle going so far away to school, as well as the coursework?"

Sara stared ahead for a moment. "Yeah. I think so. They're so shaky right now. If they can make it through this year, apply and get their grades this year, then they'll be fine. I worry about them turning out too much like me, but they're a little more

well-adjusted than I was. We can hope anyways." She laughed nervously.

_Her eyes were piercing. "You don't give yourself enough credit, you know." _

Nick shifted nervously under Lisa's tight glare. He hated therapy, probably more than Sara. Sara hated it because she felt scrutinized, cornered, and obliged to tell every dark secret from a childhood she wanted to forget, just so the professionals could deem the childhood 'in the past.' She was a fan of repression acting out unconsciously.

Nick hated it for a different reason: it was pointless. He didn't need it and hated the fact that everyone thought his adamant belief he didn't need therapy, even after horrific things had happened, was denial and repression. He'd dated a psychology major in college—Linda'd analyzed him to _death_, with mock tests and trials that she created during her 'Survey of People and Personalities' class junior year. Between her and the obnoxious snippets therapists had given him, Nick knew his personality. He was an acceptor, a fixer, and a reconciler. He was extremely laid back, a 'true type B,' who didn't let things that were beyond his control affect him or cause him guilt and grief. (That was Sara's problem about a third of the time.) Nick, after the initial fear and anxiety, knew that getting buried alive wasn't his fault. Yes, it creeped him out, made him value life more, made him avoid certain situations.

But he wasn't going to carry it around like a shell on his back. Doing that would let the madman win. Nick was going to live his life without fear, accept consequences, and try to control the little portion of the universe he had carved out for himself. Everything was a problem-solving exercise approached scientifically: identify the problem, find a solution, execute the solution. He didn't bury things; he didn't let things fester. Most of the time, anyways. He just forgot about them or fixed them. Usually his worries centered on those close to him, like Sara or Warrick or the girls or his parents, but he didn't let himself get consumed. He knew this made him seem shallow, or simplistic, or even less competent, but he knew it just meant he could let things go. He knew his trouble spots; he knew he sometimes relinquished too much control for the sake of keeping things running. He knew that sometimes he let others speak for him and got carried away with the tide too easily, that he sometimes tried too hard to fix things and was ultimately disappointed. But for the most part he liked his personality. It let him be a CSI without the nasty, guilt-ridden side effects that Sara often had when she couldn't close the case, and gave him the easygoing confidence and sunny, optimistic innocence that he cherished in a world he knew was not innocent. He'd rather be helping people and feeling satisfied, holding onto some shred of humanity, than feeling hopeless and twisted and guilty, all so he could feel deep and complex. He didn't share things like this with the therapists, he didn't share details of his childhood either. Most of them just gave up, and pronounced him okay, but Lisa was working a little harder at digging underneath him.

He still had flashbacks sometimes, to the Burial or the Gunpoints or even the Babysitter, but there was nothing more to talk about there. He was coping; he could cope. He was a fixer, dammit. Sitting in therapy made him feel like an indolent child.

He shrugged, "I give credit where it's due." He'd spent the first forty-five minutes detailing the situation with Sara and Grace and Jules for Lisa; she'd been on the lookout for anxiety masked as plain worry, but hadn't found any. "They're strong girls."

"Nick, from what you've described to me, you're essentially the emotional rock for three very emotionally fragile women. When relatives are sick, a caregiver often ignore his or her own health and well being in order to take care of the sick family member. Those three probably did that for Lilly, as she was dying, and now that the attention is on them, it's your emotional health that's getting abused."

"I wouldn't say I'm being abused." Nick said, affronted. He hated that word. "I'm being supportive. Of them. They're the ones that need things right now."

"Don't get consumed." Lisa sat back. "Know your limits."

"I always do." Nick said. "The reasons I'm here were always out of my control, remember?"

"Yes, of course." Lisa said. Nick had been sent to her several times; she knew him pretty well. "What I mean is—don't ignore your own emotional signals because you feel Sara and the girls are in crisis, it will only make things worse in the long run. Don't invest yourself in their lives so that you feel less alone."

"I'm not alone." Nick said stubbornly. Lisa tilted her chin downwards and to the right and quirked an eyebrow. "What?"

"Nick—we've been over this every time that you've had to come to me. And, I'm afraid, you're getting entirely too comfortable here. The only times I got anything useful out of you were the first few sessions, when you were so shaken that you answered completely honestly. You're getting good at denying everything, even and especially to yourself. You're putting up walls."

He returned her look with a level chin and clear eyes. "Lisa, I have coping skills and I have confidence that I'm going to be fine. There's going to be repercussions, and I'm just going to deal with them, instead of stressing and worrying about the future. I'm sorry, but I think I'm dealing very well right now."

"Your issues aren't dealing with anxiety over the future, Nick."

"Can we stop referring to my life as a series of 'issues'?" Nick spat. "Things just happen, and I just react naturally. That's where the nightmares and flashbacks fall, if there are any. But right now I've chosen to make Sara and the girls my priority, because I feel that's where I can get the most satisfaction."

Lisa looked at him doubtfully. "Nick." She said, her patient voice bordering on patronizing. "Dating a psychology student in college and having a Zen master for a boss does not make you an expert in psychology or psychiatry. And there's a difference between becoming emotionally invested in a relationship because you care for the other person and because you're doing it to take the heat off of yourself. So please be a little more open-minded and considerate of my suggestions."

"Hey, I am!" Nick said irritably, spreading his palms. "I'm listening. I'm taking notes! But I know my limits and I know my feelings about having a relationship, so I'm going to know when to throw in a towel or when to step back, and right now I'm perfectly happy with the relationship. And I'm doing great with the work situation—I have friends there, I'm interested and happy, and there's nothing left over from last May!"

Lisa sighed, frustrated. Nothing else was going to be accomplished. "Alright. I have another client in five minutes." She shifted in her seat. "Have a nice week."

"You too." Nick smiled and stood, though he still felt very dissatisfied. Why the hell didn't Lisa believe him? He knew what he was doing.


End file.
